Night-Blooming Cereus (昙花一现)
by ZoeRubyJackson
Summary: She died in an explosion, which was a pretty sketchy situation itself even if she wasn't the one who planted the bomb. So when she opened her eyes again, clearer than ever, she wondered, what the hell does fate want with her. Punishment, atonement, second chance... She has no idea, and she might never find out. Reincarnation!OC, Uchiha!OC
1. Chapter 1 - Reanimated

A/N: So this is my first fanfic, and I kinda just run with the idea, a reincarnation story that draws some inspiration from the Chinese online stories I've been reading. The OC does not know anything about the Naruto world prior to her reincarnation, so she's like a stranger to the new land, but with perks since she retains her past experience and intellect. Anyway, the story started a bit slow, since the first chapter is more or less setting the scene, so please, give it a try!

Huge thanks to my beautiful friend and beta Alice J, her grammar tips saved me countless times.

Disclaimer: I'm never going to own the Naruto anime or manga, ever, I've accepted that fact. So everything belongs to their rightful author (AKA Kishimoto Masashi), except for my OCs. I am definitely not making money out of writing this. This is a disclaimer for the whole story since I'd rather not have to put it before every single chapter.

Also, to clear any confusion, the way I list their names are according to the Japanese way, which is the last name then the first name. (ex, Uzumaki Naruto), because I think it rolls off the tongue better.

I named the story after a kind of flower in a Chinese legend, 昙花 (tan hua) **,** which loosely translate to night-blooming cereus. It was said that it only blooms once in a lifetime for one night and then it dies. It was often used to describe a one-hit wonder, but not always. As for why I choose the name here, it will be explained in later chapters.

Anyway, enjoy!

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Chapter 1 - Reanimated

On June 18, 2016, I died.

That year, I thought I turned eighteen. At least, that's what my identity should say.

How did I die? Most likely from the severe burn and multiple punctured organs caused by an explosion. It was a standard raid and kill mission. The target was a group of international drug dealers, one of the competitors for the organization "OLYMPUS". I, formerly operative 31, now given the codename "Artemis", was the one who led this mission.

OLYMPUS does all kinds of things. Black ops, assassination, infiltration, wipeout raid. I was still not sure how they decide what mission to take or reject, even after working under OLYMPUS all my life .OLYMPUS was strange, it was an organization that didn't simply rely on money or authority.

I lived in OLYMPUS, lived for OLYMPUS, and in the end, died for OLYMPUS. I was trained as a black operative. Assassination, infiltration, and combat, I was well versed in all of them. That's why I was given the codename "Artemis", after my potential as a "hunter" was discovered. I was sure that I became a perfect agent, ruthless, emotionless and loyal, all in the name of survival. When I was three and became cognitively able, I quickly understand that there was no way out of the organization. Either I become strong and able to survive, or I will be disposed of. That's why I trained hard, along with a natural instinct for survival, I made my first kill when I was six. And from that time, I threw all my emotions into a black pit behind my brain, keeping it trapped like how the Olympians threw the Titan Kronos into Tartarus, so he may never be free again. Just like that, I became a perfectly cold-blooded killer.

It was supposed to be a simple mission, we get in, we kill the ones in charge, we plant a bomb, we leave and we explode the place into a million pieces. That's why I couldn't figure out what went wrong, or rather, but I didn't want to believe it.

We got in, we killed the ones in charge and we planted a bomb. Then, everything went wrong. The bomb was set to detonate in 10 minutes, plenty of time for us to get out and set the building on fire. However, just as my team was retreating, the bomb went off. It was only one minute after the bomb was planted, there was no way we could have gotten out of the explosion range in time.

Just like that, "Apollo", "Medea", Operative 19, Operative 63, and me, forever disappeared in the fire and smoke. The bomb might have malfunctioned or been discovered, thus resulting in the explosion earlier than we planned; or more likely, the bomb was set by the organization as one minute, not 10 minutes like they had us believe.

Why? To make sure that the bomb wouldn't be found out in the ten minutes range, or to make sure that the agents would die with the secret. After all, an explosion of this caliber, hundreds of lives, were not something they wanted to be related back to.

Just like that, I died, at eighteen years of age (more or less), most likely by the organization I gave my life for. I am disposable since after I died, someone else would be branded the codename "Artemis", and my existence would be no more. Even with my self-taught method for burying emotions, I couldn't help feeling betrayed. What I didn't realize was that it opened a dam, a little creak into the abyss I closed off. So when I was drifting in space or consciousness or wherever people were supposed to drift after they died, I felt like I experienced a life full of negative emotions. Guilt, ripping me apart from the inside and out, so painful that I guess the barrier of death couldn't keep it out. The sadness, the regret, the loneliness, they came like waves, crashing into whatever consciousness I have left, overwhelming but unavoidable. They burned, but at the same time, they froze like the ice age. At the end of the abyss, I reached out and found the memory I rejected the most, my first kill, my first hidden emotion, my first action that tainted my heart into black, and operative 32... _I am a horrible human being_ , I thought one last time. _I guess I deserve a worse end than death._

However, someone, something, some power, screwed me over. I was ready to die, take my punishment and end this meaningless life. Then I opened my eyes once again, staring into a group of huge men and women with clearer vision than I would have ever imagined. Although that came with a splitting headache, it felt like something flowing inside of me were all getting sucked to my eyes to support my abnormal hyper-vision. In my short attention span, I noticed a flow of a certain strange current inside all of these men and women watching me, something akin to a special kind of energy, a magical substance.

The adults were muttering something, I couldn't hear them, but I could see the movement of their lips perfectly. In my lifetime, or rather, past life, I was well trained in lip reading and five different languages: English, French, Mandarin, Russian and Japanese. I suddenly realized that they were speaking in a rather formal Japanese and that was all I could conclude before I closed my eyes due to a painful headache and the feeling of exhaustion. I slipped into a slumber again, praying that this was just a phase before I get to die completely. However, a small part of me, even if I didn't even realize, was hoping that maybe, just maybe, I got a second chance. A second chance at living my own free life, or at least a chance of redemption.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on my perception, I was indeed alive once again. I lived my first year in a mix between confusion and mind blowing. Despite being reborn as an infant, I retained some of my previous memory, pleasant ones (do I even have any), the unpleasant ones, and all my level of intelligence. From the information I gathered from all the adults talking when they had no idea that I could understand them, my most prominent impression was that this world is crazy.

Apparently, the world I now lived in was full of ninjas, a life energy called chakra, and wars. My name - an actual given name, not a number or a code name - was Uchiha Maiko, daughter to Uchiha Fugaku and Uchiha Mikoto. I had one brother who was one year older than me, Uchiha Itachi.

Being born in a prominent shinobi clan had it's pros and cons. For one, I now had a family, although I had no idea if this was what I want, being isolated in a ruthless training facility for eighteen years, I didn't know if I have the capacity for love. Another pro had to do with my eyes, or the sharingan - the Uchiha kekkei genkai. I realized soon enough that the clearer vision I gained during my birth was due to the sharingan awakening. Of course, since it required chakra to support the sharingan, it caused my splitting headache and exhaustion, since I couldn't properly control it yet. Nevertheless, I became the first person in Uchiha history to awaken the first tomoe sharingan upon birth.

My brother, Itachi was a prodigy. Today, on June 18, my first birthday, he performed a small Katon: Grand Fireball technique in order to please the demanding elders. As small as I was, I could see their greedy eyes, eyeing him like prizes. It was the look of those who wanted something, against all cost. Itachi being a two-year-old little boy had already developed his stoic poise. His calm eyes overlooking everything like he was drifting on a canoe far far away. Sometimes, I got this strange feeling that he was just like how the operatives at OLYMPUS used to be, emotionless and isolated.

I didn't doubt that Itachi thought of me as something precious. He probably thought that if he performed like a genius, then the elders would overlook me and leave me alone. No doubt, my little awakening at birth stunned the elders, and they were dying to get their hands on me, another 'prodigy' of the century. It was only with me and Mother, Itachi would show a bit of smile, a bit of playfulness and occasionally, the childishness that was of his age.

After my second birthday, I saw Itachi significantly less than before. I heard that he started to get lessons from Father, who aimed to create another strong Uchiha leader. One day, he came home with his clothes half burned and tore. Mother and I were startled by his appearance, and no matter how hard Mother tried to persuade him to tell her what happened, Itachi wouldn't budge. Late at night, I heard Mother and Father yelling at each other, with a little concentration, I understood why they were fighting. Apparently, today's training session was built to awaken Itachi's sharingan, the near death experience and killing intent induced high emotional states that allow the activation of sharingan. Hell, they even planned a fake kidnapping just to make Itachi think the killing intents were real. Just like that, Itachi gained his sharingan, and he just turned four.

That night, I stumbled into Itachi's room, under the dim lights, I locked eyes with him, the four-year-old boy who was my brother. I felt a pang of guilt for everything he had done for me. If he didn't have to cover for me to keep the elders' attention away, he would not have to try so hard to exceed their expectations. I had no idea what my eyes are expressing, but I had a feeling that he knew that I knew. For the first time, I approached him, like a three-year-old child, I crawled into a position beside him, Itachi hugged me close. For the first time in three years, I called out to him the endearing term "nii…." and all he did was smile.

Shortly after Itachi gained his sharingan, I turned three, and that's when my training began. No matter how hard mother tried to persuade my Father to let me start training later, he wouldn't budge. Soon, I started sharing the same training schedule as Itachi. Morning, we would have taijutsu and weapon training session with Father. In the afternoon, we would have chakra and ninjutsu session with one of the elders, a rather strict and rigid lady. At evening we would have sharingan lessons from another elder. Of course, this was only the standard training menu, Father would always give Itachi more training to do when he didn't have lessons with the elders. Being a hard worker as he was, Itachi would always diligently finish his extra lessons without complaints.

When my physical body started to adjust to the training sessions, I started to plan for my own training as well. In the previous life, I was a very proficient assassin and combat operative. I would shamelessly admit that my hand to hand close combat skill was top notch. Even with my small body frame in my previous life, my lack of strength was never a problem as I only aim for the spots that would break easily for the kill. Neck, joints, throat, and sometimes even cracking their spines if I came from the right angle. Fast, accurate and ruthless was probably the best way to describe it. The Uchiha fighting style that Father was teaching us right now was more aggressive and they required harder punches and more power, which was something I simply didn't have right now. Even with the help of sharingan, sometimes throwing a power punch would get me off balance if I missed the target. So every morning, before the session starts, I would secretly train my old fighting style. Flexibility stretches was key, in my old life, you really didn't want to let me get close to you. As long as I locked someone, I could use my flexible stances to maneuver my position and I could easily crack their spines and necks into positions no one wanted.

Every morning, I would start with gymnastic maneuvers, and then move onto actual close combat training. Using an old dummy I found in the training room, I would practice different ways to crack people's bones and joints, either from fast and accurate punches and kicks or from locking the body and twisting it using my flexibility. Usually, moving partners would work better, but well, it was supposed to be a secret, so beggars can't be choosers.

The weapon training was kind of a pain. Apparently, Uchihas were supposed to be good at throwing daggers - I'm sorry, kunai and shuriken. The problem was, in my time, we used guns. In fact, my marksmanship was great in my previous life and I had no problem seeing and marking for the bull's eye, but the throwing motion was making me want to crawl into the hole in shame. Sure there were those who were very proficient in dagger throwing in the organization, but I was not one of them, and there was the fact that the grip for kunai and shurikens were just plain weird. Well, I sucked at it at the beginning, I was pretty sure Itachi excelled at this kind of stuff when he started the training. Trust me, Father's eyes beamed every day when he and Itachi returned from weapon practice during the first year of Itachi's practice. Now, his face was either blank when he returned with me after practices, or sour whenever I managed to hit something I shouldn't hit. Of course, I was still young with no experience, so I could still grow proficient in it, or at least that was what father wanted to believe.

The chakra and ninjutsu training was just plain freaky. After three years in this ninja world, I thought I would get used to the strange power people seems to possess here. But no, after I saw the grand fireball jutsu the elder performed for us, I was absolutely stunned and terrified by it. Immediately, I was determined to learn all I could in this area, seeing the fact that no matter how good my close combat technique from the other world was, it would be no match for this monstrosity known as jutsu. If I wanted to survive in this world, then I would have to be a master at this. So my free times was filled with chakra molding and controlling exercises as well as hand seal practice. It might be because of my famous Uchiha gene or my higher self-control due to my older "age", my chakra reserves were quite large and my chakra control was okay. With a fair amount of practice, I could already mold chakra to enhance my body in taijutsu a few months after the start of my training. Obviously, Itachi was better than me in this area as well, but at least father was not as sour as he was when we did the weapon training.

To be honest, the sharingan training must be the most interesting training I had ever heard of. Having something different in my eyes were both terrifying and mesmerizing. In fact, I had not activated my sharingan again after the time I did when I was born, but somehow, when the elder asked us to show him the sharingan, I activated it with ease. I blinked and let my chakra rush to the eyes when I opened them again, my visions were much clearer and I could see the flow of chakra in Itachi and the elder's bodies. In the first year, we started with learning how to control sharingan activations and how to distinguish chakra we saw, then we started on the genjutsu. Eventually, after two years of training, both Itachi and I had completed the evolution of our sharingan to three tomoe.

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

Everything that broke the temporary peace I may or may not had seemed to happen in the year when I was five. The first thing that seemed to put the fragile wheel we called fate into motion was a boy named Shisui.

That morning, I was practicing my self-taught style of close combat. After two years, I managed to return some of my previous skills to a degree that was satisfactory for me right now. Since my body was still five, there were a lot of things I couldn't accomplish. However, I was able to perform maybe at most ten percent of my level in the previous life. I succeeded in hiding this style from Father, but like usual, Itachi found out but he did not tell anyone about it. Actually, sometimes, he would spar with me so I could get used to practicing on a living target. Although he seemed reluctant to try again after the first time we sparred, and for the first time, I felt a bit of pride against him. It was unlike the time when I beat my opponent in the organization during the assessment, during that time, it was not a victory, but rather a survival, gaining my own life by beating others would potentially mean pushing the other to the brink of death. There was no pride, only a sense of dread that most of the operatives were too numb to feel about.

Itachi came like usual, but this time, he brought another spectator. For a second, I thought it would be Father. It's not that I didn't trust my brother, but rather I couldn't think of anyone else he would bring. But when I halted my training to look at the new arrival, I saw a young boy, several years older than us, wearing the same kind of Uchiha high collar t-shirt as Itachi (I hate those high collars…).

"So, Itachi, this is the Maiko-hime you wanted me to meet?" The boy suddenly appeared in front of me out of nowhere. I was intrigued by this so called body flicker technique since it pretty much disobeys any law of physics I had ever learned. So for a second, I did not register whatever he was saying, and simply stayed silent.

"Wow, you are as cold and silent as they say." The boy continued in a teasing manner.

"Sorry for my rudeness, but who are you?" I finally asked. He was obviously a member of the Uchiha clan, but I'd been ordered to stay in the compound for as long as I could remember and the only people I met were the elders that were assigned as my teacher.

"My heart bleeds, Itachi, how come you've never told her about me. Hime, I am Shisui Uchiha, a friend of Itachi, he said he wanted me to come here today so I did." The boy - Shisui- answered after he feigned hurts at Itachi. I stared at Itachi with an expression that silently asked "Really?", seeing he did not contradict, I took the silence as a confirmation.

"My apologies, Shisui-san, it's a pleasure meeting you. However, I am not a 'Hime', simply Uchiha Maiko." I felt that excess socializing was not really beneficial right now, seeing most people already avoided me in the compound, I guess that awakening sharingan at birth did speak of something wrong with me.

"Itachi-nii, I thought you promised to spar with me at least once per week, are you here to keep that promise?" I asked innocently, noticing Itachi paled a bit at the prospect of sparring with me. In truth, I rarely won against him, but that was just because Itachi was being a genius all the time, but I imagined it wouldn't be feeling so great fighting against me.

"Right, that's why I brought Shisui with me. I'm sure that he will be interested in your… eccentric fighting style." Itachi quickly answered in his monotone voice. Shisui, on the other hand, looked very intrigued by Itachi's words. He quickly flickered onto the other side of the training room and asked "Taijutsu? Body flicker?"

"Of course, just Taijutsu, and body flicker is allowed." Technically, I didn't even know body flicker, so definitely not up to the level Shisui just showed. However, from my understanding, body flicker was not teleportation, but rather utilizing chakra to enhance one's body to allow it to move at a speed that human eyes couldn't follow, which meant, if I could lock my opponent's body then they would not be able to flicker away without enough force.

We performed the seal of confrontation simultaneously. It probably looked quite comical from far away, seeing Shisui was significantly taller than me. Without further ado, the sparring started.

Shisui was no doubt a talented individual, his taijutsu was a mix of traditional Uchiha style and high-speed body flicker. In the beginning, he flickered in front of me in the blink of an eye, then he threw a punch toward my midribs. I did not want to be hit by one of his power punches, mind you, so without any hesitation, I dodged by jumping up and let his fist flew under my feet. Before I could even land, Shisui flickered behind me and aimed to grab my body while it was till in the air. It would have succeeded if I had not prepared for it and twist my body and bend it in mid air. Instead, I did a backflip and landed on my hands before doing a back walkover and then landed on my feet about a few meters away.

Shisui did not give me anytime for prepare. When I looked up again, I barely managed to see him reappearing in front of me again and threw another punch towards my head. The body flicker was starting to annoy me now, I swore, right after this session, I was going to learn and perfect the body flicker.

Instead of jumping up again, I flipped backward, making an arch with my back. The moment his arm sailed right above me, I shot up my legs and locked it between my two calves. Using his momentum, I twisted my body along with his hand, strengthen my leg with chakra flow. My feet were locked right on his shoulder joint. When it twisted, it let out a small pop, signifying the shoulder was dislocated.

Now that I was finally able to touch him, obviously, I was not going to let him go. With his body flicker, if he managed to get away, I won't ever be able to touch him again. This time, he let his guard down for a second, and I was able to catch him. Without a second thought, I bend my arm slightly and let it rebound, pushing my body up in the air. Shisui's other arm was already swung toward me, if I gave him time, he can very well fling me towards the ground and crush me there.

When I fall back to earth again, I brought down my arm and latched it right onto Shisui's neck behind my head. Curling my leg up to a fetal position, then I crashed my knees into Shisui's spine. When I landed on the ground, I pulled his neck down with me, using the momentum, I crashed him in front of me like a shoulder flip. The moment he landed on the ground, I wrapped my arms around his neck and used my knees to push him to the ground. I lifted his neck up a bit and tightened my grip. Usually, in my old world, one twist and the neck would be broken.

"Okay, let him go, Mai. It's his first time." Itachi ordered from the sideline. Slowly I released my arm from the choking position. Shisui let out a few coughs before standing up.

"Oh, hime, that's harsh, I think my shoulder is dislocated. Itachi, serious, what the hell did you get me into." Shisui complained, but he still did a seal of reconciliation and I returned the seal like the tradition dictates.

"That's because you've never fought her style before. Now you learned a lesson." Itachi commented, he still remembered the first time he fought against his little sister, it was a world of surprises and hurt.

"Sorry for the shoulder Shisui-san, but I assure you the neck bones will hurt a lot more," I said calmly before walking toward Shisui. It's pretty awkward as a five-year-old petite girl grabbed onto the right arm and the shoulder of a larger boy, however, I pushed them back together with full force without giving Shisui or Itachi anytime to object. With another pop and a pitched scream, Shisui's shoulder was as good as new (maybe).

"There, as good as new, I didn't hurt any tendons or anything, so keep it rest for a day or two and watch for any swelling, you should be fine." I gave him a perfect smile as I watch Shisui gave my brother an "is she serious?" look.

"Nice job, Maiko-hime, violent, but your taijutsu is nice! Can't wait to see the pain it will bring when you master body flicker." Despite the sore shoulder, I gave him, Shisui showed me a genuine smile. I contemplated, not only was he on point about what I thought the direction of my taijutsu should be, I saw no resentment in the boy's clear black eyes. Doesn't he hate me? Doesn't he think I'm an abnormal little monster?

"Teach me." I said shamelessly as I watch his eyes widen with surprise, "please teach me body flicker." I repeated again.

"And you are asking the person whose shoulder was dislocated because of you?" Shisui gave me a disbelieving look as if he was checking my sanity.

"Why not, you are good at it, Shisui-san. Besides, I put your shoulder back to its place, didn't I? Surely, someone as generous as you wouldn't be holding a grudge against a five-year-old girl, right?" Now both Shisui and Itachi were looking at me as if I was crazy. Then, after a moment of silence, Shisui laughed.

"Sure why not, Itachi and I usually have some training afternoon when he doesn't have classes. Why don't you come along, and I'll show you the great body flicker of Uchiha Shisui!" Shisui suggested. I looked at my brother, he showed no sign of disapproval. Like usual, I took his silence as a yes.

"Of course! Thank you, Shisui-senpai, I guess I'll see you and Itachi-nii later!" I gave him one of my perfect sweet little smiles and I saw him brighten up at the prospect of being called senpai.

Later, when I walked away to put the training stuff back, I could hear Itachi's calm and stoic voice telling Shisui "You are too easily pleased" to which Shisui responded brightly "That's only because you are too hard to please."

(◕ω◕✿)

Sasuke was born when Itachi was six and when I was five. When Mother found out she was having a third child, she was absolutely ecstatic, while my father seemed less so. If I were to be harsh, I would say he was indifferent. With Itachi bringing him the glory of a prodigy, and me bringing him the fame from my sharingan, he probably didn't know what he would want from a third child. However, being the perfect husband he was, he celebrated it along with Mother.

When Sasuke was born on July 23, I was suddenly hit with the acute realization of how Sasuke's life would have been different if I was never born. Sasuke was a boy, a male just like Itachi. If I wasn't born, he would have been the second heir for the Uchiha clan, and of course, seeing how cautious my father was, he would want to build up a second powerful possible heir in case anything should happen to Itachi. However, I was born. Even if I was a girl, the fact that my sharingan awake at birth was a feat worthy of a miracle. Even if the stats are slim, there were powerful kunoichis in Uchiha family. Even if my skills weren't on par with Itachi, even the elders had to admit that my talent was far above average. So now, Father was definitely raising me as the second successor instead of Sasuke, and that would have significantly lessened the amount of pressure he had to face, as well as the number of expectations.

I wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not, but just like how Itachi tried (keyword: tried) to protect me from the focus of the elders, he and I also wanted to protect Sasuke from the heavy burden the clan dumped on us. When I first made sense of this feeling of wanting to protect him, I gave myself a shock. Why I would care for someone that I had just known for a few hours, as he was only born a few hours ago. Mother and Itachi I understood, they cared for me and protected me, it was only natural that I reciprocate their affections. In this second life, I had a chance of being loved, and I wonder if that had changed me more than I thought it would.

Just three months after Sasuke was born, all hell broke loose. We hid in the house, Itachi hugged me tight, and I hugged Sasuke tight in my arms. He was just a wee little baby and I guess I couldn't blame him for crying a river when there was a deadly destructive force rampaging outside in Konoha.

Once again, my view of the world was shattered by the appearance of this so-called tail-beast. I got the feeling that it's similar to the nuclear weapon, but… alive and more powerful. Sasuke was crying because of the poisoned and malicious chakra the tailed-beast, Kyuubi, was emitting. Had it not been for his Uchiha genes, Sasuke would have been worse off than just crying.

I thought that night was the first night since I came to this world that I felt a sense of danger akin to death. Sure, I struggled and planned for my survival every day, I trained with everything I had, improving my skill set so I could reach a level where I wouldn't have to be afraid anymore. But this, this made me realize how much I wanted to live. The first time I died, I died too quickly for any thoughts, but now, I had the time to cling on to my life, grasping for it like a thin spider thread and never letting it go.

Sasuke was crying harder now, I put my hand on his face and gently caressed the tears off, "Shh, don't worry, Sasuke, it will be over soon, and everything will be okay." I said to him gently, a tone I never thought I would be utilizing. Sasuke's crying lessened for a moment, but he had another outburst when another wave of Kyuubi's chakra emitted through the air. I continued to hug him tighter, and in the darkness, Itachi's finger touched Sasuke's forehead. Sasuke's cries lessened again and his large black eyes stared towards the direction of Itachi's finger.

Despite all the malicious intent surrounding us, I managed to find a chuckle, I murmured quietly to Sasuke who probably didn't understand a single word I said, "You are right, Itachi-nii will always be here for us, always." Sometimes, I forgot that Itachi was only six right now, still only a child.

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Thanks for the read! Please review if you ever feel like it, cause I like reviews or just general comments!


	2. Chapter 2 - Dango

A/N: So here's the second chapter, this is technically where the story line finally begins and the events unfold. So enjoy!

Again, beta'd by Alice J

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Chapter 2 - Dango

We started the official Academy when I was five and Itachi six, after Sasuke was born. I was pretty sure that the Academy was just a formality for father, an official way for Itachi and I to get our genin status. In fact, I was sure that father would have pushed Itachi to enter the Academy a year ago, but I guessed mother convinced Father to let him stay for a year so that he could go to the Academy with me. Father expected us to graduate within a year, and I doubted we would fail.

The 'Homeschool" in Uchiha compound was not a joke, I could shamelessly say that my skill level was definitely on par with a genin, and if my previous life's experience in black ops was added, then I would have a large amount of experience in drawing blood as well. After some training from Shisui, my body flicker technique had gotten a lot better; now I was able to use it to get into close vicinity with my opponent in short range, and if used right, I could snap their neck before they even realized how they died. It was a lot of 'if' though, seeing shinobi were a lot more alert than normal humans. The ninjutsu training was also going well. I learned basic ninjutsu such as transformations and clones and I got tested my nature affinity using the chakra paper. Of course, affinity did not necessarily mean the limit of my ninjutsu elements, but it would be a good place to start with ninjutsu in elements that I had the affinity for.

The paper showed that I have fire and lightning affinity, thus the elders started me on their famous Uchiha fire jutsu. I had to say, the sharingan worked wonders with learning jutsu, since it had the ability of copying jutsus. Although copying jutsu didn't necessarily make it yours, but it gave us a feeling of how a jutsu was supposed to work and helped a lot when we tried to practice and master them. Currently, I had learned several fire releases already, including the signature Great Fireball technique. But whatever I learned, Itachi would have learned it already and moved on to something new. It would have been frustrating, except that I had already long accepted the fact that he was just that amazing.

Since the Academy was a waste of time in our father's eyes, he picked up the pace for training whenever we got back to the compound. At this point, I thought Father had finally accepted that I was never going to be as good as Itachi in kunai and shuriken. To be fair, I could hit a target more or less when we were talking about moving targets in open field, thanks to my kinetic vision. However, the fancy stuff that Itachi did with two shurikens and letting one hit the other in midair thus hitting two targets in different directions at once, I sucked at that.

So one day, Father brought me to the armory. I was pretty sure he thought that I definitely needed to master some form of weapon, and if long range projectiles were not going to work for me, then I might as well start on something else.

There were some strange things in this world, and my natural attraction toward kenjutsu was one of them. I couldn't explain why I chose the bokken, a wooden training sword, out of all the weapons available in the armory, as I'd never used it in my past life. Usually, swords were considered outdated, and its length was considered disadvantageous for assassination missions. For that reason, I'd never as so much as touched a sword, let alone training in it. But the strange long piece of wood just spoke out to me, and for once, I did not stand there and analyze their pros and cons, I just went out and grabbed it. So now, I had a bokken strapped on my back, and I had no doubt how weird it looked. Uchiha clan didn't have many great kenjutsu masters, so father told me that I had to wait until he could find someone for me. That I had no qualms with, seeing as I already had a lot of skills needing practices that would keep my hands full.

The trips to Academy were almost ritualistic, we came to Academy on the first day, the teacher saw our Uchiha clan crest, and he took us straight for evaluations. By the end of the day, we were led to the fourth year classroom, the highest year.

"Everyone, we have some new students today, this is Uchiha Itachi, and this is Uchiha Maiko. Let's get along." At the teacher - Fuji sensei's motion, Itachi and I nodded our head toward the class and none of us said anything.

I looked around the classroom and analyzed the students. Most of them were from shinobi clans. There was one Hyuuga, one Yamanaka, one Nara and even two Uchihas. I had never seen them in the compound before, but with their signature high collar t-shirt and their arrogant expressions, they were definitely from Uchiha clan.

Our reputation preceded us. In the Uchiha clan, I doubt there was anyone who did not know of the two prodigious children of their clan leader. Even outside of the Uchiha clan, major shinobi clans must have at least heard of the elders bragging due to their damn pride. It's only the children from civilian families that wouldn't have heard of the rumors in the shinobi world. I imagined it must be quite strange to see a five-year-old little girl in a classroom full of eleven and twelve-year-olds. I understood, but that didn't mean that I tolerated their huge masculine ego. So when one of these twelve-year-old boys tried to trip me by sticking out their foot at the last minute, I molded chakra in my feet and smashed subtly into his ankle. Next day at Taijutsu practice, I beat him to the ground.

It was the day before the graduation exam, and we had nothing better to do other than messing around… I mean training with Shisui and Itachi.

I curled my body onto a tree branch, the three tomoe in my sharingan spun furiously as I tried to take in all the information. The brushing of grasses against the wind, the abnormal tell-tale signs of someone moving, and the concealed chakra signals of anyone here.

Something caught my attention at the corner of my eyes. Even with my sharingan, I didn't catch the full shape, so it was definitely not a hare. Without any hesitation, I did a quick hand seal and blew a great fireball in the direction it disappeared to. As soon as the fireball left my mouth, I planned to use body flicker to get out of there, since my position was pretty much as good as exposed.

Before I could get away, two shurikens sailed towards me, and I was only able to dodge by a fraction of a hair. When I saw the wire attached to the shuriken, I cursed at my luck. This was no doubt Itachi's work, only he could throw something at this accuracy against all the obstacles and still managed to keep the wires untangled. If the wired shurikens were here, then that meant….. I grabbed the branch and swung down without a second a hesitation. When I landed on the ground, two great fireballs soared above me following the pathway of wires and crashed into the trees, letting the fire burning the trees into a fiery bonfire. _Fine, you want to play this way, let's play._

I gathered chakra around my feet and ran toward the direction where the wire came from. I couldn't beat Itachi in long range combat, but if I managed to get him into a close combat, I might had a chance. Usually, it was stupid to run up to your opponents, but I believed that I could dodge whatever Itachi threw at me as long as I'm in the hyper-aware states with sharingan. We'd been at this for fifteen minutes, because of the sharingan, none us had been able to hurt anyone so all we'd been doing was throwing fireballs or shurikens at shadows or casting genjutsus. I was taking a risk since we would be here all day if all we did was hide from each other, and I was a proactive person.

I didn't even bother to cast a genjutsu on myself to hide from the surrounding, sharingan would see right through it. Like I expected, not even five seconds after I started, a stream of shurikens flew towards my face. Gymnastic and body flicker, my best tools to get away from this flurry of sharp objects. After a few twists, flips, and flickers, I finally moved past the shurikens. Soon after, the fire bullets arrived, it was Katon: Phoenix Sage Fire, a skill both Itachi and I had mastered. Unlike the shurikens, those fire bullets move at unpredictable pathways, I had to use the branches to carefully maneuver around those fire bullets. My best hope was that Shisui was far enough that he wouldn't have time to interrupt me; if he was smart enough, he would wait until Itachi and I had started fighting, and then deal a blow to both of us.

After a few more waves of attacks, I finally caught sight of Itachi. He was just standing there, but with my senses opened to the max, I could see his muscles tensed for the upcoming battle. I charged in first, I thought about using the bokken for better attack range, but I decided against it as I wasn't very good at it, training with scrolls was not a very effective method. I rushed towards a tree and sidestepped onto the trunk, then I propelled myself towards Itachi. My first strike was welcomed with empty space, Itachi and Shisui seemed to figure that the best way to beat me was to make sure that I never touched them. However, I was proud to say that only Shisui was successful in that. After a year of training with Shisui on body flicker, my short distance body flicker became faster than Itachi's. Unlike Itachi who was able to flicker a greater distance, I invested most of my time in trying to perfect the short distance maneuver.

I felt a breeze on my left and quickly I flicked to a small distance behind toward the left side. When I reached my destination, I could see Itachi's eyes slightly widen in shock, and before anything, I reached out and hit him on the side of his neck with my right elbow. The impact did not do as much damage as I thought, as Itachi already brought up his hand and blocked the attempt. Immediately, I spun around and used my other hand to grab onto his shoulder. I jumped up and swung my leg in a circle and forcefully moved my other hand to create a lock on his neck. Smash! One of my knees crashed into Itachi's back with full force, and Itachi grunted a bit before his body naturally curled backward due to impact. Using that momentum, I pulled my arms down and attempted to fling him over my back and crash him to the ground.

However, Itachi seemed to quickly recover from my hit at his spine. As he reached out his hands in midair, I could see the blazing fire chakra gathered at his hand. With a frown, I had to body flicker away if I did not want to get burned by his new trick. It seemed like a new jutsu he had learned, and I was definitely going to ask him to teach it to me afterward. Just imagine if I could burn my opponent upon contact and create an opening from the shock and the pain. While I flickered away, Itachi adjusted his posture and finally landed on his feet about five meters away from me.

Just as I was about to charge again, a wave of kunais and shurikens showered down upon me. _Damn it, Shisui, do you have to come now?_ I cursed at him silently. Again, I had to quickly use the body flicker to get away…. And of course, Shisui would be waiting there, just when I flickered to the shade under a nearby tree.

I barely managed to move my head to avoid a strike coming for my forehead, but then I realized Shisui already flickered to a position behind me, then he dropped to the ground and swung his leg in a wide circle, sweeping my feet off the ground. I landed on the harsh forest ground with my back, the worst thing was, Shisui's fist was coming down right toward me. There was no way I could avoid it, so I instead, I let him hit me. I felt the impact on my stomach, and then I was suddenly hit with a wave of nausea. I bit down on my lip to keep nausea down, and then I grabbed his hand, swung my legs up to scissor choke around his neck. The sudden pressure applied to his neck made his hand loosen for a second, I extended my hand and hook onto his shoulder. I pulled myself up from the ground and rotated my body so that both my hands and legs were wrapped around his neck, pressing hard on his throat.

"Surrender Shisui, or I'll choke you until you are unconscious!" I yelled at him, obviously, I couldn't actually kill him, or the snap of the neck would be so much easier. But before I could hear an answer, I was pulled off of Shisui's shoulder and thrown onto the ground with a kunai pointing at my neck.

"It's over Mai, you move one bit and the kunai will kill you." Itachi said to me. I let out a sigh before proclaiming my defeat. Normally, we would go until one of us beat the other two, but both Itachi and Shisui decided to end the game early.

"I can't believe you two ganged up on me. You used Itachi as bait so you could ambush me!" I yelled at Shisui as I was getting up from the ground, hand rubbing at my stomach where I just suffered a power punch.

Shisui was still rubbing his neck, but he managed to give me a teasing smile and said: "All's fair in love and war, Hime, besides, both Itachi and I agree we do not want to experience your joint breaking anymore." Itachi nodded in agreement.

"Hold still Shisui, let me break your jaw, I promise I'll set it back later. Once more, I'm not hime!" I yelled in frustration, I told him that every time he called me 'hime', yet he never changed.

"Let's talk about happier topics! You two are going to graduate tomorrow right? Well, I'd say good luck but I don't think you guys will need it." Shisui said as we all stood up once more and started to walk back to the compound from the training forest.

"What are you going to do with this, hime? I've never actually seen you use it in a fight before." Shisui asked me as he picked up my bokken that must have fallen during our little struggle. I snatched the bokken from his hands and strapped it onto my back again.

"I'm working on it! It's not that easy learning from a scroll. I'll let Itachi deal with all the projectiles, and I'll work on something else." I said bitterly. Right now, I sort of understood the basics strikes in kenjutsu, after practicing the swings for hundreds of time each day. However, I had yet to make the motion fluid that it won't interfere with my taijutsu when fighting.

"Have you thought about what specialty you want to focus on? With that sword, maybe you should try ANBU." Shisui mentioned lightheartedly.

"ANBU?" I asked, unsure of what that is.

"The Ansatsu Senjutsu Tokushu Butai (Special Assassination and Tactical Squad), basically the black ops of the village. Usually, people shouldn't know about them, but oh well, I'm pretty sure every shinobi born in clans know." Shisui explained. My heart stopped for a second with the mention of black ops. My inside cringed at the stirred up memory of a past life.

 _There were seven bodies… their necks… their necks were twisted in unnatural angles… there was no blood… Then why was I seeing red… Red everywhere… no… there was only one body here… it's lying on the ground… a pool of blood… his neck… OH GOD… it's him… and then, it all exploded. OH GOD._

I didn't even realize I stopped walking until Itachi squeezed my shoulder. I looked up again, seeing Shisui's concerned and confused face.

"No, I don't think I will join ANBU. In fact, I will never join ANBU." I said, surprisingly calm considering my damned mental state. Shisui just shrugged my comments off, but Itachi seemed to be considering something. We walked toward the compound as the sun started to set in the west.

 _I want to survive, kill and live for myself this time._

~(◡﹏◕✿)

The graduation exam was a breeze for us. I sat in the classroom with Itachi, staring at my hitai-ate, wondering what the hell was I supposed to do with it. After much debating, I tied it on my forehead like it was supposed to be, lifting my bangs and two strands of hairs on each side of my face so that they partially covered the hitai-ate. I tied the cloth behind my head, under the neatly wrapped hair bun Mother did for me this morning.

Soon, Fuji-sensei appeared and started to announce the genin team assignment. Supposedly, a genin team was supposed to be composed of a student who ranked high, a student who ranked low and a student who ranked in the middle in the graduation exam, to keep the team power balanced. Seeing how father drilled Itachi and me to perform well in graduation exam, there's no way either of us would rank low in the exam, besides, they were not going to put two sharingan users in one team. So there came the problem, seeing I actually didn't know anyone in my class except Itachi, socializing was always too much of a hassle. Our childhood consisted of training and training, and Father wanted us to come back the moment the Academy ended, believing it was a waste of time.

Anyway, before I could think of anything more, Sensei announced "Team 2, Inari Shinko, Izumo Tenma and Uchiha Itachi". Even if I knew the outcome, I couldn't help but felt a bit disappointed at it.

"Team 6, Tokugawa Daichi, Uchiha Maiko and Yamanaka Shun" I winced at the names, not because I didn't like them or anything, it's just that I really had no idea who they were.

Soon, team after teams were picked up by their sensei, and after a while, a man with sandy brown hair who wore the standard jonin vest appeared in the class. "Team 6! Meet me at training ground six in half an hour." Without any further explanation, he disappeared.

"Well, then, I should go. See you at home Itachi-nii" I said to Itachi before leaving the classroom and headed towards training ground 6, which was essentially a little clearing surrounded by the forest.

When I arrived there, there were two other boys already there, one of them sitting with a bored expression on a rock, the other leaning on a tree nearby. The boy leaning on the tree had orange shaded hair pulled up in a ponytail behind him, must be the Yamanaka boy, what's his name, Shuu? Shun?

I walked inside the training ground quietly, however, their eyes immediately flickered to me. I sighed, walking silently to one of the corners, hoping that they would stay silent.

"Aren't you the Uchiha-hime, the second prodigy of the century." The Yamanaka boy suddenly said, I was pretty sure his name was Shun. Of all the things to say, he just had to pick up those arrogant names the elders threw around.

"Teme! I can't believe you are on my team!" The other boy sitting on the rock just had to start a 'conversation' now.

"No and no." I said to Yamanaka Shun before turning my attention toward the boy sitting by the rock "I'm sorry, but who are you?" I asked innocently, I seriously didn't know who he was.

"Teme! You've got to be kidding me! Don't you remember what you did to me at the beginning of the year?" The boy screamed, and I was drawing a blank here. My innocent and confused expression must be really convincing because the Yamanaka boy walked towards us and explained: "You broke his ankle the first day when he tried to trip you and then you beat the crap out of him during our next taijutsu session."

"That's right, teme! Don't tell me you've forgotten it." The boy whose ankle I'd broken once shouted.

"Well, then, I am sorry for all the trouble I've caused you, but you see, if you had not tried to trip me, my foot wouldn't have crashed into your ankle." I said calmly. Manners, Mother said. Behave like a Uchiha clan member, Father said. Don't let your emotions show, it's always a weakness, OLYMPUS taught.

The boy seemed flustered by my apology and the follow up 'analysis'. Too naive to figure out the real intent of the speaker, I thought, he was not suited for the killings and the deceivings. He looked like he was trying to figure out something to retort back to me, then after some thinking, he yelled: "I will beat you fair and square one day, just you watch!".

 _Interesting_ , I thought, he said with such a groundless confidence and genuine words that I couldn't feel any battle intent that was supposed to come with that. Even in training with Itachi and Shisui, we spread killing intent, the intent that promised bloodshed, so that we wouldn't be fazed by it in real battles.

"I hurt you and you promise retribution, so then why don't you have any malicious intent toward me?" I couldn't help but asked, it was so very curious.

"Malicious intent? Why would I be malicious toward you? In the beginning, I didn't like you because you seemed so arrogant. But we are classmates and now teammates. Don't get me wrong, I will still beat you for sure!" He scratched his head and said. _Interesting. Naive, but interesting_.

"Fair and square? You do realize that she is six years younger than you right?" Shun added, and the boy - Tokugawa Daichi, I believed - blushed a shade a red and yelled at Shun "Dude, you are not helping here!"

"Looks like we are all peaceful and cozy here. I'm Shinbara Akira, Team six's jōnin instructor, you can call me Akira-sensei." The man with the sandy short hair from earlier suddenly appeared on the field, and all the arguing between Shun and Daichi ceased. Like pre-choreographed routine, we bowed for our sensei and greeted "Please take care of us, Akira-sensei."

"However, you all need to show me that you are truly worthy of being in my team. I only take the strongest two as the students, so you guys need to decide, who will get to be a genin and who will get send back to the Academy." The team tensed up at Akira-sensei's words and I narrowed my eyes at his words. Konoha valued teamwork, an internal strife was frown upon almost immediately. Then why would sensei encourage such behaviour? It really didn't take a genius to understand the situation. Before I could speak up, Daichi spoke first. Might as well, I thought, then I activated my sharingan quietly, with years of practice, sharingan activation was like a second nature.

"I don't care about that, I know I said that I will beat that arrogant Uchiha hime, but I will do that fair and square as teammates! We are all here, and we can't just abandon anyone!" Daichi said, so naive and genuine, but I guess that was what they wanted. Sensei just stared at him for a second before his eyes towards Shun.

"A shinobi's strength shouldn't be dependent on who can throw a harder punch, the Yamanaka clan's skill is highly dependent on my teammates, and I want to support them." Yamanaka Shun said, there was less enthusiasm in his words, but considering his composed figure, he must have figured out the point of this test.

When all of them turned to me, they seemed shocked to see my bloody red eyes. Daichi seemed a little afraid of it, Shun was in deep thought, and Akira-sensei just stared at me, as if waiting for me to start.

"I cannot fail," I said that loud and clear, seeing the surprised and hurtful expression of my teammates, "My father and the clan would not allow it, However, I cannot simply let my teammates get disqualified, they worked as hard as I did to graduate." Shun and Daichi's expression softened, but I didn't finish, "Sensei, did you know, the corner of your mouth raised just for a millimeter when you heard Daichi's words, and the muscle on your neck relaxed a bit when you heard Shun's words. But when you heard my first sentence, your lips tightened, and your muscle tensed just for a fraction of second." Daichi seemed utterly shocked by my revelation, he muttered: "how did you…" I pointed toward my eyes, "sharingan" I said, as if demonstrating, the three black tomoe spun for a second. There was no point in hiding it, everyone would know my kekkei genkai the moment they hear my name.

"With that, I am ninety percent sure, no, your lips just parted a little now from the shock, it's barely visible, but now I'm ninety-five percent sure that the point of this test does not lie in fighting for the two spots." I concluded, Akira-sensei's stared at me for a second, then he sighed.

"Never mind, should have seen this coming. But anyway, good show of teamwork and analytic skills. From now on, we are team six, and remember that we are comrades." Akira-sensei said as Daichi threw his arm up to celebrate. Personally, I had no comradeship except for maybe with Itachi and Shisui, and that's just because we'd been practicing together for so long. OLYMPUS taught us that sacrifices must be made in order to succeed in missions; given the initiation task they gave us, I doubt that teamwork had been high on their priority. But this was the accepted behavior in Konoha, and in order to survive here, I had to abide by it.

"Uchiha Maiko, I heard that you are interested in kenjutsu. I'm a master at kenjutsu so I will train you in that. Team training tomorrow morning at seven on training ground six, don't be late. Also, we are starting a mission tomorrow." That's the last thing we heard before sensei disappeared.

"Alright then! Good job everyone, especially you, Uchiha hime!" Daichi's enthusiasm never seemed to die, he jumped in joy before trying to hug us all. I gave him a glare as just he tried to hug me, he gulped and retracted his hand in fear. I was pretty sure my display of sharingan earlier scared him.

"Call me hime one more time and I will break your arm." I said coldly, I don't know who started this stupid nickname, but only Shisui was allowed to call me that and that was still debatable.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

For the next two month, we started on D-rank missions around the village. It was quite boring, but I wasn't in a rush, considering the fact that I wanted to get my kenjutsu skill up a level before we went on any dangerous missions.

Akira-sensei agreed that when facing larger, adult opponents, the sword would give me a longer reach and draw blood easier. I showed him my practice instances, and he frowned.

"Your stance is nice, actually, it's almost textbook like. But it wouldn't do you any good if you couldn't incorporate it into your battle. I want you to think of the sword as an extension of your arm. From now on, I want you to practice swings while you are fighting, it's going to feel weird at first since it interferes with your normal fighting style, but the more you practice the more you will get used to it. Also, I want you to practice it with both hands until you are completely fluid with it." Sensei told me, and he gave me a dummy infused with chakra that can perform basic taijutsu movements. I was tempted to ask how to do that so I could practice with a living target at home, but then I remembered sensei had already told me once that it was some technology from the research and development division.

Every day, after we did an hour of team cooperation exercise, Akira-sensei would give me pointers on my kenjutsu, and then he would have me practice for the rest of the duration when he went and taught Shun and Daichi. Every week, I get a chance to spar with Akira-sensei in kenjutsu, although after the first time he accidently let me touch him and almost dislocated his shoulder, he would always beat me down before I could even reach him .

The dummy in front of me moved, one of its arms struck down with a bokken. I lowered my body and dived down, holding out my right arm with my own bokken. I slashed its leg and let it stumbled. Quickly, I twirled the bokken in a semi-circle and lined it along with my arm. Then I grabbed its sword arm and twisted, hearing the inhumanly crack of wood near its joints. I found that if I ever needed a quick change from sword to hand, twirling its end the sword would line up along my arm works just fine. After I disabled its right shoulder, for the time being, it tried to punch me with its other arm, while keeping me trapped with its legs planted on the ground. I dodged again, switching the bokken from my right arm to the left, and while it was trying to retract its arm, I stepped on its leg. Using it as a jumping point, I hooked my arm onto its neck in a familiar motion, swinging myself behind the dummy. At the same time, my knee crashed into it's back and the bokken in my left arm plunged itself into the place where a human's brain stem would be. Since I used chakra to enhance my bokken, it left a hole in the dummy all the way from the back of the neck to the forehead where my bokken was sticking out. Eventually, the dummy fell to the ground and had to be recharged before it could move again.

I was a bit disappointed in the power of the training dummy. Supposedly it was the strongest they could make for the time being, and it's said to be about mid-chunin level speed, form, and strength, but its motion was too rigid and unlike human, so it's not the same as fighting a human. I did not know why Akira-sensei kept on getting them for me even if I almost always broke one every three days, and that's when it was a good day, but I guess it may have something to do with the testing period for the R&D division.

"Maiko, come and gathering, we are going for a mission!" Akira-sensei yelled from the other side of the training ground. Quickly, I pulled out the bokken and starting to drag the dummy toward the others. It took a few minutes before I arrived since the dummy was not light to move. When Akira-sensei saw the hole in the middle of its head and the detached arm, he sighed and put his hand on his forehead.

"Really, Maiko, already? I swear I just got you a new one yesterday." Akira-sensei grunted and I had to give him an apologetic look. Daichi and Shun looked absolutely horrified at the hole that went through the dummy's head.

"Never mind that, we are going to do another mission today, so follow me to the mission assignment desk." Akira-sensei said and led the way.

"Are we going to do a C-rank mission today?" Daichi asked with excitement. Honestly, I didn't know how he could keep the enthusiasm. Every time we did a mission, he always asked sensei if we could do a higher rank mission, but it never happened.

"No, we are doing D-ranks until the lot of you won't get killed in missions" Akira-sensei warned. When we arrived at the assignment desk, we immediately got a mission for sorting crops. I didn't even know why somebody would pay for this. I was tempted to use the sharingan to separate them faster, but then I decided that it was too petty of me to do so. In the end, we spent three hours on the farm separating the rice from the wheat among a few other crops.

"Geez, when will sensei let us do some fun missions." Daichi complained as he rubbed his shoulder. We were walking home from the farm, and since we are all heading towards the living quarters, we went together.

"We are still rookies, you know, they usually keep us from doing C-rank mission until we've done D-rank missions for six months" Shun explained, aside from being the sensor of the group, he seemed to the one who explained most of the stuff to Daichi. Unlike Daichi, whose skill as shinobi was pretty average in all area, Shun already picked a specialty in sensory areas. The Yamanaka clan's jutsus were ultimately built for information gathering and sensory abilities.

We walked past the commercial area and I suddenly saw a sweet shop on the side of the road. I stopped on my track and walked toward the shop, Shun and Daichi also stopped and looked at me.

"Mister, may I have five servings of dango please?" I asked the owner of the shop - a man in this forties - politely.

"Alright, little miss, coming right up" He answered with a smile, then he went and prepared it.

"I didn't know you have sweet tooth, Maiko." Shun said teasingly beside me as they waited for me.

"Ah, sorry about the wait. But no, it's for my brother. He went on his first C-rank mission a week ago, and he should be home today." I answered, remembering fondly of how Itachi always loved to eat sweets but was too composed to go get it himself.

"Uchiha Itachi?" Shun asked unbelievably, "That guy who graduated the same time as us? How come he get to go on a C-rank mission?" Daichi yelled.

"That's because he's Itachi, he's the best." I answered vaguely as if that explained anything. Itachi was, no doubt, the best I've seen in this generation, because of his potential, his teacher and my father might have pushed him to take on higher ranking missions. He was forced to grow up, unlike me, who already had a grown up's mind.

"Thank you, mister." I paid the money and took the dango from the owner, then I turned to my teammates, pulling out two serving of dango and held it to them, "Here, have some dango for your trouble, I'll see you two tomorrow" I said using my normal indifferent voice before leaving.

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

"I'm home." I said quietly to the empty house, Father was most likely in the elder's meeting, and mother was probably out with Sasuke. I put my equipment down and then walked along the hallway, soon, I reached one of the bedrooms.

"Itachi-nii". I opened the door to reveal Itachi sitting by his bed, organizing and sharpening his shuriken and kunai. His equipment looked worn and used, due to the fact that he was on a long mission.

"Here, your favorite sweets." I dropped the dango in front of them, it was always fun to watch the usually stoic Itachi try to control himself from snatching the dango straight up.

"Thanks, Mai, did you have some yet?" so rarely, he gave me a smile, then he picked up the dango quickly, looking tempted by the sweet aroma of rice dumplings.

"Mhmm, not yet, I want Itachi-nii to eat first." I said as I sat down beside him. I saw Itachi moving his fingers and I thought he would be reaching for the dango. Instead, he lightly poked my forehead with two of his fingers fondly. It was a light touch, yet I could feel the deep bond it made. It was a touch warmer than basking in sunlight, more comforting than the flow of chakra, reaching deeper than the hundreds of thousands of blood vessels in my body.

 _Is this what family feels like? If so, then I don't want to live without it ever again._


	3. Chapter 3 - Avarice

A/N: I'm posting the first three chapters at one go to give you all a better idea of the story, maybe... Anyway please enjoy!

Beta'd by the amazing Alice J ^-^

* * *

Chapter 3 - Avarice

A week later, we finally got our first C-rank mission. The main difference between a C-rank and a D-rank mission was whether or not they potentially required fighting an enemy. While Daichi jumped in excitement with the prospect of more interesting missions, I contemplated the idea of finally fighting potential enemies.

Daichi and Shun did not understand, they fought to be a shinobi, but I fought to kill. They hadn't seen me fighting for real in hand to hand combat, the sparring I had with them in taijutsu was nothing compared to how I fought with Itachi and Shisui, and that's nothing compared to how merciless I could be when facing an enemy. I was certain, that if I were to engage with the enemies with no restrain, there will almost certainly be casualties, either theirs or mine.

Nevertheless, we received a standard escort mission and Akira-sensei told us to meet him at the village gate at 1100. I went back to the compound quickly and grabbed my supplies, I packed my bag with enough shurikens and kunai, then strapped it to my leg. I strapped my bokken on my back and sliding it into the thin obi tied around my long vest to secure it.

"Good luck on your mission, Maiko!" mother said to me as I prepared to leave the house. Sasuke was one-year-old now, he awkwardly toddled towards me and hugged my leg tightly.

"Nee-chan… goo.. Good luck!" I smiled at Sasuke's attempt at speaking full sentences. I rubbed his head, gently picked him up and brought him to Mother.

"Bye, Mother, bye Sasuke, I'll come back in a week or so." I said to them before I walked to the village gate.

We left exactly at 1100. The group we were escorting was a caravan of merchants from a village near the outskirts of Fire Country, they had a shop in Konoha's commercial center. After a season's business, they needed to go back to the village to replenish supply and also to take their earnings home. It's a perfectly straightforward deal, mission: escorting and bodyguarding. Duration, possibly around seven days. Potential danger: wild animals and bandits.

The leader of the caravan was Tomachi Kojirou, a man in his forties. He seemed like a benevolent old man who worked hard in appearance, but I didn't really care, as long as it wouldn't hinder the mission.

Akira-sensei followed the caravan from behind, he told us that he wouldn't help us unless we were in life or death situation. Daichi stayed in the front of the caravan, Shun escorted the caravan from the side, and I travelled on trees to get a better view of the surrounding. Shun's sensory ability really helped a lot on this trip, every time, he sensed something incoming, either Daichi or I would go and take care of it. For most of the time, they were just wild animals, a few kunai and shuriken would take care of them.

At night, the caravan people would set up the camp and fire for warmth. One of those nights, Tomachi-san smiled gently and asked us "The lot of you are awfully young, you sure you can handle the tough journey?" Daichi immediately answered defensively "Oyaji!, we are already genins, we are shinobi, you bet we are going to be finishing this mission in flying colours!"

"Haha, that's good, young people need to have strong will. What about you, young lady, feeling brave in the presence of this young boy?" for some reason, the conversation was directed to me. I faked a smile and said politely "thank you for taking care of my teammates, I'll go survey the area, if you don't mind." Not feeling like talking, I did my best to slip away unnoticed, hiding in the shadow. Just as I was watching from the shadows of the trees, I felt a presence beside me. Not sensing any malicious intent, I kept still, already knowing who's beside me.

"Not feeling like socializing, Maiko?" Akira-sensei asked me as he sat down on the branch beside me.

"Not really, I just want to go survey the area for potential danger." I answered plainly.

"You have to admit, the team needs a leader, Daichi is brave and passionate, but he is too hot-headed. Shun is calm, but his meek personality is not suited to lead the team from the front. But you, Maiko, your talent as a kunoichi is outstanding, and you have the natural born calmness and decisiveness that make you leader material. I know you are young, but you need to make your teammates trust you, and you need to trust your teammates" Akira-sensei explained calmly, I stayed silent for a few seconds, taking in his words. He made it sound so permanent, as if the genin team was our future and everything.

"So much responsibility, sensei, I really don't think I'm suited for this. Daichi will do fine when he grows a bit, and Shun will help him. I've never told anyone this, but you know my clan, Itachi will be the leader like everyone wanted, and I will be supporting him from the shadows. I never planned on leading anything, all I'm doing is to survive." I responded with cold voice. There was no sound responding me, I guess Sensei must had left after my disappointing answer.

After six days of travel, we almost arrived at the client's village. We had just travelled for ten hours today, and Mr. Tomachi decided to rest for the night, before advancing to the village tomorrow. There was still half a day's journey left, but the sun had already set.

Suddenly, Shun tensed, he closed his eyes and concentrated. "Everyone freezes, we have incomings!" He yelled all of a sudden.

"Animal? Civilian? Shinobi? How many? What direction?" I asked.

"Their chakra signatures are not big enough to be shinobis, probably bandits, there are about 10 to 15 of them. They are coming from the northeast direction." Shun answered. After hearing there were possibly 15 bandits, the whole caravan seemed to be full blown panic. Even Daichi looked dazed by the news, and Shun seemed very unsure of what to do.

I sighed, suddenly seeing sensei's point. I yelled to thin air, knowing that Sensei would be watching us from somewhere, "What level of force are we allow to use." a moment later, a voice answered "you are allowed to use any force necessary to protect yourself, your teammates and the clients, preferably capturing the bandits alive. If not, use deadly force."

"Alright, everyone, listen to me, all the civilians, please return to your caravan, and stay inside. Shun, how far are they?" I asked in a serious voice, thankfully, all the civilians stayed close to the caravan like I asked them to.

"About 100 meters away right now." Shun answered.

"I will cast a small genjutsu to halt their movement, Daichi will take the east and I will take the north, when you see their movement stopping, pick the ones that are far from others, then do whatever you can to keep them from fighting, knock them out, kill them." I said to Daichi, and he nodded nervously. Then I turned to Shun, "stay beside the caravan, protect them, keep tabs on the signals, notify us if there are more incoming. If you see anyone needing help, go help them." he also nodded. Finally I said to both of them, "if you are in a pinch, use a replacement jutsu or body flicker to get out of the battlefield. Don't be soft, it's either them or us."

We quickly got into the position I assigned, "Shun, how far are they?", he answered: "50 meters".

"Perfect, I will cast the genjutsu now, stay alert." I said as I activated my sharingan, black tomoes spinning furiously in my red eyes, quickly locating the shade of chakra in the northeast direction about 40 meters away. I quickly did the hand seals for the vertigo genjutsu, it wasn't a super powerful genjutsu, but I could cast it on a wide area, making the targets experiencing momentary nausea, confusion and weakness. "Now!" I said as I sensed the spread of chakra signature faltered. Upon hearing my voice, Daichi immediately sprung out and I followed him.

I immediately found a male bandit who stumbled due to the vertigo genjutsu. I body-flickered myself to behind him and immediately smashed my chakra enhanced feet into his right knee, clearly breaking his kneecap and bending it at an awkward angle. The man yelled in pain, but I didn't stop there, without hesitation, I grabbed both his arms one by one and twisted them until a clear pop sounded, finally, with a kick, I sent him to one of the trees with three limbs broken. Without stopping, I catched another faltering, pulling out my bokken, I lowered my body and flickered to behind him. I struck him with my bokken forcefully on his neck, as he fell, I used my other arm to pull his body backwards and kneed him in the back. I probably used too much force, since I heard a crackle sound from his spine; usually, when I sparred with Itachi and Shisui, this much chakra enhancing will only make them feel extreme pain, not break their back. I didn't even wait to watch the man fall down to the ground, he probably won't be walking again unless some miracle treatment happened.

Quickly, I took out another two men with the same method. I thought about using the fire release techniques, both Great Fireball Technique Phoenix Fire Technique would be useful and quick in getting rid of the enemies. But they are too lethal against non-shinobi and could potentially burn the forest. I also tracked Daichi with my sharingan, and he seemed to be doing fine, a little nervous, but he picked out two men from the side and fought them using taijutsu and kunai. After a few exchanges, he overpowered his opponents and tied them in ninja wires like Akira-sensei taught them. I nodded lightly at the progress, Shun also targeted some bandits using shurikens projectiles, and he was keeping them from approaching the caravan. Like I thought, a group of bandits with only 15 people were amateurs, they were neither trained or organized, or otherwise, Akira-sensei would not leave us with this many enemies.

Seeing the remaining enemies are closed in, I flashed Daichi a signal that told him to fall back so we could regroup and attack together from the caravan. He nodded and we used our chakra enhanced speed to bypass the bandits. As soon as we arrived in front of the caravan, we attacked fiercely again. I lashed out and dislocated a few more joints, smashed a few more knees, and knocked out a few more bandits. It was tempting to just twist their necks and get it over with, but maybe it was not time yet to show that side of me. However, it was slightly frustrating that I wouldn't be able to use the full power of my close combat style, after all, it was never used for show, but to kill.

Just as I was finishing off an enemy on my side, I noticed Daichi on my right faltered a bit. I quickly kneed the man in the back, hitting his knees with my bokken and let him fall to the ground. I turned and saw Daichi being restrained by one of the larger bandits. The bandit kicked him in the stomach and punched away the kunai in his hands. Shun was quickly to work as he tried to shuriken the hell out of the man, but the bandit seemed to found a piece of wood fallen from the caravan and used it to block the flying weapons. I could see his eyes red from anger, he was probably the leader of this band of ruffians, and seeing their prey being snatched away and his underlings falling one by one must had really made him mad.

Shun being Shun, he quickly changed his plan and lashed out ninja wired, trying to pulled Daichi out of the way. I understood his plan immediately and body flickered toward the bandit leader. I appeared above him, and I struck the bokken down in a swift motion, hitting his elbow, making him drop the wood shield he picked up for himself. I twirled the bokken around and allow my body to fall. In the meantime, while he was still too slow to react, I brought both of my arm up and locked them around the man's neck. I pulled forcefully, and kneed him on the spine, hearing the slight cracking sound and his loud yell in pain, forcing his body to arch backwards unnaturally. Using the momentum, I did my favorite move, I arched backwards as well and threw him over the my head. When his chest hit the cold hard ground, I pushed my leg up and did a backflip, landing right on him.

I made a quick decision as my knees dug into his back, pushing his chest to the ground. I swiftly pulled his head up and wrapped my hands on the side of his head. Willing my chakra to flow to my arms, I twisted his neck in full force. With a loud crack, his head limped in an unnatural position, and his eyes void of any sign of life. I made a decision to kill him, because he was too strong for me to hold down; because he would not stop attacking if I did not restrain him due to his emotional instability; because Daichi needed medical attention and I needed to end this quickly.

When I stood up again, I checked the surrounding to make sure there wasn't anyone left, then I turned my attention to the caravan. I saw Shun and Daichi's shocked face, laced with hints of fear. Suddenly my heart faltered, and I stopped on my track. _Why do I care what they think?_ Instantly, my head was suddenly flooded with images. Bodies, necks twisted in unnatural angle, they were all my previous missions for OLYMPUS. They were like films, flashing image after image, it was so overwhelming for a second that I clutched my head trying to ease the discomfort. _I thought I buried them all, I guess I didn't_.

"Maiko, are you okay?" When I opened my eyes again, I saw Daichi and Shun running up to me, the fear in their eyes was gone, and all that was left was the concern. I shook my head and realized that the images were gone. I quickly glanced at Daichi, who was clutching his stomach.

"Are you okay, how's your injury?" I asked him, and he just laughed, "Don't worry about it, I'm just feeling sick because that asshole disturbed my dinner." Shun shook his head at Daichi's description, then he looked around, probably sensing if there was any moving target.

"They are all done, we should alert the officials to pick them up to prison." Shun concluded, and Daichi seemed to understand him perfectly and immediately ran off to borrow messenger birds from the caravan group.

To our surprise, Akira-sensei also appeared in front of us, he stopped Daichi for a second and said to us "Good job, everyone, nicely done. Maiko, your plan is well thought out, but you need to understand your teammate's ability a little more, as a teammate, you can't let Daichi run along alone beside you when you know he can't follow your speed. Also, why didn't you communicate more with Shun, or he could have alerted you about the danger coming for Daichi." Sensei stared at me mercilessly as I dip my head in an apologetic way. I had to agree with him, I should have stayed with Daichi a bit closer, then nobody would get hurt.

"But you did great as your first time commanding the team, the genjutsu was a good call and it gave your team mates opportunities to strike." Sensei gave me a little smile before he reached out and grabbed my shoulder to comfort me, "Don't worry about the kill, it's your first time kill and I agree with you, your attention should have been about the wellbeing of your client and your teammates, ending things as quickly as you can is the best way. Besides, your performance in the battle is excellent." I didn't disagree with him out loud, although in my memory, this was definitely not my first kill, as to the number, I had already forgotten to count them.

"Daichi, your timing is great at the beginning, watching for opportunities to strike." Sensei continued onto Daichi, and he beamed at Akira-sensei's words. "However, when you were faced with a superior opponent who was obviously emotionally unstable, you should alert your teammates for help. Maiko was right beside you at that time, and Shun was right behind you. If Shun hadn't pull you away and Maiko didn't clean up your mess, you would be severely injured, so count yourself lucky, but Shinobi can't rely on luck." Daichi nodded hard at sensei's words.

"Lastly, Shun, your role was well played, as a sensor in the team, you kept your teammates alert, and provided them help when needed. However, you should speak up about your ability and allow your teammates to incorporate them into fights." Sensei commented and Shun nodded his head. Finally, Akira-sensei smiled at us and clapped his hands, "Alright, Shun and Maiko will clean the battlefield and gather up the bandits, while Daichi and I will discuss means of communication with the clients."

As Shun and I walked into the battleground and started to pick up discarded shurikens and to tie up remaining bandits, Shun got a chance to closely examine my 'work'.

"Brutal, it's amazing how you knocked them off so cleanly." He expressed as he tied ninja wires around a man's body, who was still unconscious with his right shoulder and right kneecap dislocated.

"Amazing?" I questioned with uncertainty.

"Yes, you don't have to worry about us judging your way of fighting or the fact that you killed that bandit. We are all shinobis, and we understand the point of our jobs. Frankly, I'm amazed by your skills, I've always thought I already judged you very highly, but after this, I realized that I still underestimated your skill. Daichi also feels the same, and I'm sure he is grateful to you for saving his life." Shun finished his words and gave me a big thumbs up, I stared at him for a moment before moving onto the next bandit.

"Wow, that must be the most heart to heart moment we've had ever since we became a team." I couldn't help but say, and Shun just chuckled at my remark.

"We should all do it again sometimes."

"Maybe…"

Very soon after the battle, the local authority came and picked up fourteen prisoners and one dead body, The rest of the mission went by without a hitch. We arrived at the village the day after, and we stayed their for a day to recuperate before heading straight home, spending another two days on the way back. Eventually we came home after ten days and collected our first C-rank mission pay along with the record of a perfect C-rank mission.

(◕ω◕✿)

After our first C-rank mission, we spent another two months focusing on team training and D-rank missions. Before I even realized it, June and July were already over, which meant that I turned seven while Itachi turned eight. We didn't particularly celebrate our birthdays, Father gave us some speeches about keeping up with the training and mother expressed awe in how big we'd grown. Itachi and I were too busy keeping up with the clan training anyway, although Shisui and I did forcefully dragged Itachi to his favorite sweet shop to eat mochi and dango on his birthday.

Sasuke's birthday was different; Mother, Itachi and I both stayed for the night and celebrated it with Sasuke, who just wanted to eat his cake and curl up in mother's arms. This year, he turned two, still too young to be trained. Though I suspect that father would most likely start training him at four, a good age for Sasuke to be physically and mentally prepared, at least by the Uchiha standards.

It was one of those hot days in August. Even though it was currently nine o'clock at evening, the humid air still radiated heat. I sat by the koi pond in the inner yard, holding little Sasuke in my arms. I wore a simple white T-shirt with the Uchiha fan crest on the back and a pair of gray shorts. My shinobi shoes were taken off and put to the side as I dipped my feet into the koi pond in an attempt to escape the heat.

"Maiko, can you watch Sasuke for a while? I need to go run an errand." Mother said to me as she quickly prepared to go out.

"Of course, Mother, take your time." I answered. If mother went out, then that meant there will only be Sasuke and I at home for the next little while. Father and the majority of the clan were still in a clan meeting at the shrine, and they should be back later tonight; Itachi was out on one of the D-rank missions with his team, and he should also be back soon. Although the Uchiha compound was big and hosted a clan, the residences are quite spread out and separate, thus the main house was kept isolated with the rest of the clan.

"Now it's just you and me, Sasuke, what do you want to do?" I asked lightheartedly. Sasuke was my treasure, ever from his birth. I'd come to accept that my heart beat for him as well. I was different from my past life, although some parts of my personality would never change, I had the warmth of a family, and it was absolutely mesmerizing. More than once, I'd contemplated the teachings of OLYMPUS, _cut your ties, cut your emotions, for as long as they exist, you will have weaknesses._

My family was my weakness: Mother, Itachi, Sasuke, Shisui, if any one of them was involved, my logical analysis would shut down, my center of focus would become tunnelled, and I would make mistakes, fatal ones that would cost lives. But this was a weakness I was willing to take. It was funny that I would take in the concept so readily, after eighteen year of being conditioned to deprive of it. One would thought that I gained an immunity, yet from the moment I felt it, I grasped for it. Clinging hard onto a spider thread, until I could get inside the spider web, letting the threads bound me with no regrets.

"Mai-nee-chan! Games!" Sasuke said in his childish voice, I chuckled at my carefree brother, who decided that playing with my shoulder length hair was good enough.

It was all so quiet, too quiet. The unease I felt washed over me, and without hesitation, I brought out the sharingan. Casting genjutsu in Uchiha compound, they were either really stupid or really confident. Alas, their genjutsu was definitely not confident, with one simple glare, the genjutsu broke, revealing a strong killing intent emitting throughout the room.

"Sasuke, get behind me." I lowered my voice, and Sasuke obediently scrambled behind me. Suddenly, a rain of shuriken came crashing down on us. I quickly scooped up Sasuke and ran toward the other side of the living room. The bokken in my room was too far away, so I went for the spare bags of shuriken and kunai Father stored in living room for emergency. As I ran, the wave of shuriken followed closely behind me, one of them scratched my arm as I shield Sasuke from one of the strays. With one huge jump, I hugged Sasuke tight to me chest and slid on the floor to reach the cupboard. I reached in and quickly pulled out the bag, but just as I was about pull out the weapon, a slash of lightning came straight for my hand. Quickly, I retreated my hand, and the lightning pierced the bag of weapon and knocked it to the scorched ground a few meters away.

Every cell in my body screamed for me to run away. From the projection of the weapons and the lightning jutsu, there were at least two enemies who were highly efficient in ninja arts. They were quiet enough to infiltrate the Uchiha compound, meaning they must had confident that they could finish whatever they want before anyone notice. If it was only me, then I could make a run for it, but Sasuke was here, my speed would slow down, and I couldn't risk the danger of not knowing where the enemy was. What should I do? Stall for time and identify the enemy. Whether I decided to make a run for it or fight would have to go from there.

"You don't have to hide anymore, I can see all of you." I yelled and activated my sharingan, faking my confident and knowledge, hoping they would take the bait.

"As expected of the Uchihas and their sharingans, even the little ones have such formidable eyes." Two men stepped out of the shadow, the one in front of me spoke while the other stepped out to block the entrance.

"What do you want with us! Speak!" I yelled again, my left hand gripped hard onto Sasuke, in case there were more. However, my sharingan did not detect any more chakra signature, and I did not see any more irregular movements using my enhanced vision.

"Run away, young girl, leave the boy behind, this does not concerns you." the man in front of us spoke again. Both of the men wore black gears, with cloths covering their face. They did not have any hitai-ates or anything that could identify them to any village, but I could hear the foreign tones in their voices that didn't belong to the native Konoha.

"Not happening." I snapped coldly, without any more hesitation, I flashed the hand seals for Katon: Great Fireball Technique, and gathered the chakra to my chest. I blew out a fireball and sent it straight for the man in front of us, hoping that it will hit in some way and maybe the fire and smoke will alert the others in the compound.

The man was definitely startled by the fire jutsu, as he quickly stepped out of the way, but the fireball followed closely and grazed by him, crashing into the wall behind him. Using the smoke, I picked up Sasuke and the bag of weapons and ran for the door. The other shinobi blocked the door and shot out another string of lightning. I barely dodged it as I put Sasuke down behind a table by the door.

I pulled out three shurikens and threw them toward the shinobi at the door. My projectiles were not as good as Itachi, but they were decent. As expected, the man moved right to avoid the incoming shurikens. I didn't want to use fire jutsu on him since I didn't want to accidentally burn down the entrance.

I picked up Sasuke again and dashed for the door. So close, I was only a few meter away, As long as I was out, I could ask for help, and the enemy would have no advantages in pursuing me. _Yeah, like that will happen._

I was too concentrated on sending Sasuke out, I didn't even notice the kunai lashing from behind me. At first, I didn't even realize the pain and blood from my right shin due to the adrenaline. Only when I fell to the ground, I realized that a kunai had pierced my muscle, and my body was pulled back by the chain attached to the kunai. I clenched my teeth and grabbed onto the kunai, with one forceful motion, I pulled the blade out of my leg. Suddenly, I felt a bad vibe, and form the corner of my eyes, I could see the shinobi I distracted with shurikens were approaching me swiftly. His target was of course, Sasuke, who was crying and stood in front of me in a daze.

My mind quickly went clear from the pain, as this point, anything would do. Quickly, I formed the hand seals for Katon: Phoenix Sage Fire. dozens of fire bullets shot out of my mouth, and they went straight for the shinobi coming for Sasuke. In the midst of smoke and fire, I ignored the painful scream from the Shinobi buried in phoenix sage fire as I pulled out a kunai from the bag of weapons and pushed it into Sasuke's hand.

"Sasuke, Run! Go find the adults! Quickly!" I yelled at the crying boy, who seemed too paralyzed to move. "Go! I'm counting on you!" I said one more time before pushing him out of the door with a rush of chakra. As soon Sasuke was out of the door, I pushed myself up and reached for the door. I could try my best to run out, or I could close the door and try to stall them. I didn't even have the chance to evaluate my choice before a kick on my side sent me flying and crashed into the table.

"You little bitch!" The first man stared at me venomously as he retracted his feet from the kicking motion, he then yelled towards his comrade by the door whose clothes were half burned and body lined with scorch marks, "Did you get the brat?"

"That little bitch threw the brat out, the smoke and fire were making too much as a commotion. We need to get out now if we want to escape!" the man answered in a choked voice, obviously trying to get the smoke out of his trachea.

"Damn it. Doesn't matter, her eyes will do. She has the sharingan, it's better than the brat who didn't even activate his eyes." The man reached for me, and he grabbed my leg to stop me from moving away. The house was on fire now, the smoke and the heat was suffocating me, I desperately wished I learned some water jutsu before.

I struggled to get out of there, and my movement showed more panic than I would ever want. I raised my other leg and attempted to kick the shinobi away, but my body must have been really slow and small compared to his, with one strike, he hit my leg away, and then he stabbed my right thigh. He laughed sadistically and pull the kunai down as my flesh torn and blood rushed out, staining the floor crimson.

"You brought this on yourself! If you just handed over that boy… all of this wouldn't have happened!." He pulled out the kunai and raised it over my head. Red blood drops dripping down my cheek. "I'll gouge your eyes out and present it to our leader-sama, then I will be promoted!" The shinobi laughed hysterically, I could almost see his mind running wild from the emotions and the greed.

He gripped the kunai tighter and brought the sharp point down with laughter. At that moment, the sharingan exaggerated the image, it used to help me see the movements of the enemy, but now, all I could see was the sharpness of the kunai. The metal was pointing straight at my eyes, my precious eyes. As if I could see the future, that kunai would strike down and the searing pain that accompanied the blindness would overwhelm me. _Gosh, it's like my eyes exploded… exploded…_ I wanted to close my eyes, I really did, but they seemed to stuck open no matter what. _Why can't you let me die in peace?_

As the kunai went down and desperation filled me, I witnessed something amazing. Something crashed into the shinobi from the door just as the kunai touched my skin. The shinobi went flying and crashed into the wall, and the kunai only managed to make a thin line of blood by my left eye. Something busted into the door, and there were yelling and screaming. My eyes gave out, the sharingan faded, and I lost consciousness.

 _"Get away from my child!" …_

 _"Maiko!"..._

 _"Mai!"..._


	4. Chapter 4 - Trauma

A/N: The update schedule is still not set in stone, but each chapter should take about a week to update (graduating high school, life is busy). The only reason that the first four chapters are up so quickly is because I have written some before hand. But seeing the school is starting in five days, and I have loads of courses this year, I can't promise the chapter will be up as quickly as right now.

As usual, Beta'd by the awesome Alice J. Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 4 - Trauma

I woke up in the hospital, staring blankly at the ceiling, trying to remember what I could from the hazy memories. I willed my sharingan to activate, and they did without a problem. A sharp image flashed in front of my eyes, the red kunai dripping blood onto my face, dying my eyes red. My hand twitched for a second, but I bit my lip and kept myself conscious through the flashing of that image.

 _You are safe, your eyes are safe, and nothing will ever happen to you eyes again if you become stronger_ , I thought to myself desperately. I was no stranger to trauma; physical trauma would heal eventually, but mental trauma was not that simple. However, I learned how to deal with it very early during my time in OLYMPUS. I walked on blade tips everyday in that organization, if I broke down every single time something traumatic or some near-death experience happened, I would be disposed of before my second mission.

There were no major physical damages accompanying the pain, except for a little red thin line by my eyes. The persistent image was most likely due to the supervision of my sharingan and I would probably be seeing the flashbacks a few more times before it would fade away into a manageable level. I would need to keep in check my emotions. I couldn't gave in to the negative emotions and fears when the flashbacks happened, instead, I needed to face it and accept the fact that it happened. _It's funny how I have the courage to face my trauma, but not the courage to express or accept my feelings._

The image slowly disappeared, and I didn't seemed to be suffocating during the end of it compare to the beginning. Next, I pulled the white cover off of my body and started to inspect my wounds. A huge bruise on the side of my stomach, a few more scratches on my arms and a few minor burns and a wound on my left shin. Finally, thick dressings covered the huge laceration wounds on my right thigh. I was glad that there were no internal injuries, at least none I could feel.

"Uchiha-kun, you should rest, please lie back down onto the bed." The nurse - Hanami, or whatever it was on her nameplate - said to me, and I lay back down obediently.

"How long was I out?" I asked.

"Not very long, you were unconscious for 20 hours because of chakra overuse and blood loss, and you will have to stay in the hospital for another two or three days. It's almost dinner time and I already alerted your family members, so they should be here soon, don't worry." She gave me a trademark hospital smile and left the room.

I rubbed my head, trying to fit the missing pieces together. Sasuke, what about Sasuke? I saw a figure walking into my room, and I immediately yelled out "what happened to Sasuke?"

"Not even a word of thanks for your savior, really, hime?" two familiar male figures walked into my room, one of them with messy black hair, the other one with the long black hair pull into a small ponytail.

"Itachi-nii and… Shisui-senpai" I said slowly, maybe sounding a bit more surprised than I had planned.

"Sasuke is fine. He escaped the main house with only a few scratches." It was Itachi who answered my question.

"What happened?" I asked, feeling like I am missing a huge part of the story.

"Are you telling me you don't remember my valiant effort in saving you?" Shisui took a step back, and I just stared at him confusedly and unimpressed. Shisui gave me a sigh and he continued speaking, his voice suddenly turned serious.

"Yesterday night, when Itachi and I were returning to the compound, We found Sasuke running out the compound. He seemed distressed, but he quickly explained the situation." Shisui explained, "After we heard about the attack, Itachi went and get the clan head, who was very close to the compound at that time, and I went inside to get you. After I disabled the enemy, Itachi returned with your father, and they captured the two attackers and brought you to the hospital."

"Sasuke couldn't explain things very well, so we don't have all the information. I believe father will be here soon to discuss the event with you. You should rest a bit before he comes." Itachi said to me.

I shook my head, not feeling like falling back to sleep again. I turned my head to Shisui and said "Thank you, Shisui-senpai, I promise I won't dislocate your shoulder anymore in the next year." very rarely, I expressed my true gratitude, but this time, I meant it, and I couldn't help but saying a joke to him.

"You hear that, Itachi? Told you that you should have traded place with me." Shisui patted Itachi in the back, seeing him winced at the future to come.

"No, I probably wouldn't have gotten there in time, seeing your body flicker is so much better. Mai, how are you feeling?" Itachi quickly composed himself and asked with unusual gentleness.

"I'm fine, a bit lightheaded from the blood loss, but they said I can get out of the hospital in two or three days." I explained, but before Itachi could ask anything else, the door opened and entered my father and another adult.

"Maiko, this is Yamanaka Inoichi-san, head of Konoha intelligence department." Father introduced the man with the pale blond hair with his usual serious voice.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Yamanaka-san" I attempted to get off of the bed and bow, but Yamanaka-san stopped me from doing so.

"No need for formalities, Maiko-chan, I just want to talk to you about happened yesterday. As you know, we lack information on the attackers, as one of them was killed on the spot, and the other committed suicide before we had a chance to extract information. So please, tell us what you remember." Yamanaka-san said in a soothing voice.

"I was alone with Sasuke yesterday night, approximately 2100, I noticed the strange presence of a genjutsu. After I dispelled it, the enemy attacked me with projectile weapons and lightning ninjutsu. I attempted to run away with Sasuke, but I only had time to get Sasuke away before the two enemy shinobi cornered me." I paused a bit there, and then continued, "they claim that their goal was to take Sasuke, mostly likely for his potential sharingans, since they attempted to extract my eyes after I got Sasuke out. One of the attackers claimed he had a 'leader-sama'."

Father looked downright furious, and Itachi and Shisui gave off a dark murderous intent. Yamanaka Inoichi nodded at my description and said to me: "Would you mind if I look into your mind a bit, I needed to see those memories myself. It might be a bit traumatizing to you, so please, take your time deciding." I shook my head and responded: "No, please do what you have to do."

Inoichi nodded and walked towards my bed side. He placed his hands on me and immediately, I felt my conscious slipping, traveling in a mind palace, and rewinding my memory to what happened yesterday night. I saw it all again, but it was less traumatizing than I thought. I was lucky, that the shinobis didn't expect someone at my age to be able to perform powerful fire releases. I barely escaped the brink of death, now I just need to gain more strength for survive. I was an Uchiha, my kekkei genkai was vulnerable unless I had the power to protect it, and this won't be the last time it happens.

The memory ended at the sight of someone kicking the shinobi who attempted to gouge my eyes away, and then everything went black. I felt a presence leaving my mind, and when I open my eyes again, Inoichi was already talking to my father, and I saw the concerned faces of two Uchiha boys.

Inoichi waved at me and smiled before quickly leaving the room, presumably to report the information. Father walked to the side of my bed and reached for my shoulder, "you fought very well in protecting your brother. Don't worry, Maiko, I will get to the bottom of this, the Uchiha must never be underestimated." After the short speech, he left. _Of course it's all about the Uchihas and their pride, why would I ever think otherwise._

~(◡﹏◕✿)

The doctors let me out of the hospital on the third day, seeing my injuries were mostly healed. During my two day hospital stay, both Itachi and Shisui visited me whenever they could. Mother and Sasuke also stayed with me for a while. Even my teammates, Daichi and Shun, visited along with Akira-sensei. Father, however, never came after the time he questioned me with Yamanaka Inoichi. I didn't blame him, it was only natural, he was the head of a clan and he must have a lot to deal with especially after this attack.

That's interesting considering the fact that the moment mother took me home, Father was waiting for me in the living room.

"Have a seat, Maiko, we need to discuss the incident three days ago." Father said sternly, and I took a seat with mother beside me.

"We still could not find the origin of those attackers, but I highly suspect it's from Kumogakure, those people had a reputation as the bloodline theft." Father said with rage. However, despite the obvious connection between lightning ninjutsu, bloodline theft and Kumogakure, I didn't think they were the ones. The way that shinobi said 'leader-sama' was different from the usual respect and piety those from the big village had for their kages, it's full of madness, desperation and even a tinge of fear. Besides, how would one explain how they got into the Uchiha compound and choose to attack at the exact moment when there were only two children left behind.

"Hokage-sama refuses to do anything about Kumo unless we have firm proof, as if we need more. I will not let this attack on Uchiha slide, we cannot be shown as so weak and organized that we couldn't even protect our own. Think, Maiko, is there anything else, anything you need to mention, that can help us identify the attacker?" Father pressed further, then I realized: he wants me to fabricate the truth, so he could pin the crime on someone, he is using my testimony, so that even if it's wrong, he could leave it as child's words due to the emotional trauma.

"I will not lie, if that's what you are asking, father. I said all I could, and Yamanaka-san already checked my memory, everything I know, he knows." I said calmly, and I knew that father won't be pleased by my answer.

As I expected, he slammed his fist down onto the table, "You disrespectful child, how dare you talk smart with me. I'm doing this for the family, for the Uchiha Clan! You are only a child, what do you know!" He yelled furiously, I closed my eyes and readied myself for his rage, but before Father could yell at me one more time, Mother suddenly stood up.

"I will not set here and listen to you yell at my daughter, when she was attacked in her own home, due to our negligence. Fugaku, this is not the first time you disregard the will of our child! I allowed you to train her when she should have been enjoying her childhood, I allowed the elder to take advantage of her talent. But I will not let this continue! She was hurt, her life was endangered, where were you?" mother yelled at father in a voice I've never heard before, it was stronger and more determined than anything I'd heard before. At that moment, I remembered the forgotten fact that my mother was a Konoha jonin before becoming a housewife.

Father looked at Mother stunned, but he was unable to say anything else. Finally, after a stalemate, he sighed. "Fine, I'll let this incident pass. Mikoto, I will try to be more considerate, but you know the responsibility I have as a Clan leader. Maiko, you should go rest." his expression softened at the mention of my mother's name, but the softness went away as quickly as it appeared. Then, he walked away.

"I'm so sorry, Maiko, I should have stayed with you, if I didn't leave you and Sasuke alone…" As soon as Father left, Mother's voice cracked and tears streamed down her cheek. She moved toward me, wrapped her arm around my body and hugged tight.

"Your father means the clan well, but he neglected you. But from now on, I will always be there for you. I don't ever want you to be alone again." She said as she caressed my hair softly, even if her voice was cracked and on the verge of breaking, it's the warmest voice I've ever heard.

"Mom…" I said softly, as tears swell up in my eyes, yet I didn't feel sad. _Is this the happy tears people talked about?_

"Wait here for a second Maiko" mom quickly went into her room and then she came back with a box.

"Here, I want you to have something to protect yourself with. I used to think that you are not suited for bloodshed, but now I see that you need to protect yourself the best you can. In events where I'm not there with you, this will always be with you in my place." She opened the velvet wrapped box, revealing a beautifully crafted tantō. The tantō was guardless, the hilt was wrapped in dark teal fabrics, the teal sheath was perfectly polished, and when mother pulled out the blade from the sheath, the silver metal glistened. There was a carving of oni symbol on the blade near the hilt.

"This tantō was named Hyakki Yakō, the Night Parade of a Hundred Demons. This sword, along with another, used to be my family's prized possession until no one can master kenjutsu anymore, so imagine my surprise when I heard you took an interest in Kenjutsu. I thought the size of this tantō will be perfect for you right now, and I will give you the other sword when you become a Chunin." mom explained to me as she passed the tantō to me. I touched the hilt of Hyakki Yakō, feeling the comforting touch of teal fabric resonating with me. It was a beautiful sword, no doubt, but most importantly, it was a sword from my mother.

"Mom, thank…" Before I could finish the sentence, mom hushed me with her finger.

"No need to thank me, I just want you to protect yourself and your loved ones using the blade, in case I'm not there to protect you, my little Maiko."

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

"So when can we do another C-rank mission! It's been ages since we did our last one!" Daichi complained like usual as we walked back to mission assignment desk after completing a minor mission. This time I couldn't help but agree with him. It's been a week after my hospitalization, and all we did was group training and cat hunting. Itachi had been rolling in C-rank missions recently and completing them without a fail. Just recently, his team was given a task of Guarding the Fire Daimyo during his annual visits to Konoha. Although the task was highly symbolic, father was still very proud of him.

"Hmm, maybe we can try another one now. Maiko, how are your injuries?" Akira-sensei asked.

"All healed up sensei." I told him. It's true all my injuries are mostly healed, all that's left was a nasty scar on my right thigh and I got in the habit of wrapping bandage around my thigh over my shorts to cover it.

"Okay, then, let's go get you guys as C-rank mission." Akira-sensei said and Daichi cheered.

We arrived at the assignment desk, "Team six here for another mission" Akira-sensei announced. The shinobi who managed the table gave us a wave, and he asked "D or C-rank, Akira?"

"Let's try a C-rank, it's been a while, I think my team can take it." Akira-sensei said.

"Very well, your team's last C-rank mission had been well received. How about this one, it's a delivery, shouldn't be too hard, just do what you guys did last time. You guys are going to deliver some supplies and letters to our outpost near Kirigakure. It's pretty standard, and unlikely to get attacked. Although keep in mind that you should protect the supplies and letters with your life, just don't lose it and you will be fine." the shinobi explained.

"Okay, team, we will meet here again in two hours, and then we will pick up the delivery at the gates and go." Akira-sensei said as he accepted the mission and we all nodded. Quickly, I went home and grabbed the supplies for long journey. Some camping supplies and some storage scrolls. This time, I took Hyakki Yakō instead of my bokken. I'd been training with it ever since I got it from mom. I felt safe when I had it, and I was determined to never leave it behind, not wanting to be stuck in a sticky and weaponless situation like last time.

We met at the gate and Akira-sensei picked up the delivery. It was about medium size, including five small packages and one stack of letters. We divided up the packages between the three of us, Daichi and Shun both took two packages and I took one package and the stack of letters. Then we left Konoha.

The outpost was about four day's journey for Shinobi, it was very close to the sea separating the Fire Country and Water Country. Konohagakure had never been in great relations with Kirigakure, and thus the route traveling to Kiri from Konoha were mostly desolated. The forest seemed quiet, with only the sound of leaves brushing and animals moving. The whole way to the outpost seemed peaceful, very peaceful. If not for Daichi's constant chatter, the whole trip would have been boring as hell.

I grabbed the poor rabbit and broke its neck quickly, letting its life slip away as quickly as possibly. Then I brought it back to the camp and started to clean it. We were on our third day, and due to the constant requests from Daichi, I finally gave in and hunted a rabbit for him. Shun and Akira-sensei watched silently as I skinned the rabbit and cleaned the insides with ease. But Daichi, well, he was watching my motion with a feverish passion. I ignored him and continued to prepare the rabbit. When the rabbit was finally grilling above the flame, Daichi couldn't keep the boring silence anymore.

"When did you learn to do that, I thought you were kept in Uchiha Compound or whatever that is forever." Daichi asked while he was drooling.

"No particular time, just a little here and there." I responded with the simplest and vaguest answer, and then we fell into silence again.

"Why are you guys so quiet?" Daichi asked.

"That's only because you are too loud." Shun summarized, and Daichi groaned.

"Actually, I believe it's a good time to do some team bonding." Akira-sensei suddenly spoke. Pretty sure he wasn't here ten minutes ago, but then he reappeared when I started the rabbit

"Team… bonding?" I eyed him with suspicion.

"Let's talk about your dream and aspirations." Akira-sensei clarified. As usual, it was Daichi who spoke first.

"Ok! I'll go first. I want to be a great Shinobi. My parents are all civilians you know, they don't want me to be a ninja, learning how to fight. But it's been my dream since I was a child to become a Shinobi, the kind that can travel on roofs and do all the cool jutsus. I know my talent is average, but I will never give up, they say the lack of talent will have to be fixed with practice!" Daichi punched his chest, I had never seen him being this serious before, he always seemed so playful and carefree. But now, his determination shocked me, a strong will to follow one's dream, something that the Uchiha never taught their children.

After a moment of silence, Shun went next, "I never really had a set dream before, I wanted to be a sensor because I am a Yamanaka. I planned to be a support because I'm not good at fighting. The Clan had many more talented youth, so I wasn't particularly hard working. Honestly, I have no idea what I want, I am passive and indecisive. But please, give me some time, I will find a dream, for the sake of this team." Despite his confessions about being indecisive, he said with unwavering certainty. Daichi smacked him on the back and laughed when Shun glared at him.

Now everyone was staring at me, curiosity and expectations. Did I really want to open myself up to them? The old me would have never done that, I would flee or kill them on sight depending on the order. _But maybe, this time, this life, I can take a chance._

"I… My life is planned out for me. I awakened my sharingan at birth, a feat that had never happened before, and from there, my life was drawn out for me." I paused a bit, seeing Daichi's confused expression, Shun's stunned face and Akira-sensei's sad eyes.

"I started training as a kunoichi when I was just three. The elders wanted to mold me and Itachi into the perfect heirs. When we grow up, Itachi will be the prominent clan leader, and I will be his second in command, supporting him to make the Uchiha clan great. See, it's all planned out and executed, everything except an actual carving in the stone." I said sarcastically, suddenly I found a tinge of rage in my voice. Geez, where did that come from, when did I start to let emotions appear so easily.

"My dream, such as faraway thing. I thought my dream was to support Itachi-nii from the beginning to the end, and I still think so, but not in the way the Uchiha elders wanted, not abiding by the rules they set. I don't know how yet, but maybe one day, I will figure it out." That must had been the longest speech I had ever given to anyone, and it was definitely not inspirational. I looked up again and expected seeing blank and confused faces, but instead, I felt Daichi and Shun's hand on my shoulder.

"Sucks to be in a clan doesn't it? But oh well, I guess we'll just have to figure out our dreams together from now on." Shun said warmly while he gave me a smile.

"Not sure if I understood you wholly, but whatever you want to do, just remember the amazing shinobi Daichi is here with you, and there's nothing we couldn't do!" I couldn't help but chuckle at Daichi's innocent words, and Shun just right out sighed loudly. Behind us, Akira-sensei seemed relieved. For the first time, all three of us laughed together.

(╯✧∇✧)╯

Everything went to hell the moment we returned from the outpost.

Everything was fine before, the day was sunny, the shinobi at the outpost received our packages with happiness, and we left.

It was so normal, so unspectacular, that nothing should ever happen because it made no sense for anything to happen.

Except it did.

We were only one hour away from the outpost, Daichi was in the lead, Shun in the middle and I was the last. Akira-sensei was right behind us, getting a full view of the perimeter. Suddenly, a cold feeling, a natural survival instinct stopped me on my track, in front of me, Shun also paused, and Akira-sensei seemed to furrow his eyebrows.

Immediately, I activated my sharingan, Shun concentrated his mind to sensor the surrounding, but Akira-sensei, the most experienced of us all, drew his glistening katana from his waist. As he drew his sword, he yelled to Daichi, who did not feel anything unnatural and went ahead for another 50 or so meters, "Daichi! Fall back!"

Then, it all happened in a flash. I saw through my sharingan the clear image of a shinobi cladded in black with a kirigakure hitai-ate appear out of nowhere behind Daichi, who just turned around because of Akira-sensei's voice. I saw it, but my body wasn't fast enough to do anything.

Akira-sensei body-flickered immediately toward Daichi, in the blink of an eye, he was in front of him, but what he saw contorted his face in horror. That shinobi must at least be a jonin level, because his speed was just as fast as Akira-sensei. The moment Akira-sensei body flickered, his long sleek sword penetrated Daichi's body. I could only watch in shock as the sword entered from his back and exited through his front, the left side of his chest, where his heart should be beating.

That shinobi flicked his sword and let Daichi's body fell from his blade, then he proceeded to attack Akira-sensei. It seemed like that Akira-sensei would be kept for a while since he was parrying the attack seriously with full power.

 _Damn it! We don't have time to stand in shock!_ Immediately, Shun and I rushed to Daichi's falling body in mid-air, hoping to catch him. Unfortunately, we were stupid to think that there was only one attacker. Another man appeared in front of us and he brought his sword down with lightning speed. Immediately, I drew Hyakki Yakō from my back and met his sword in mid air. When our swords clashed, it was clear I was at an disadvantage. His blade pushed mine closer to my chest, and I only managed to stopped the attack when it was one inch from my face. No matter, I gave Shun a look that told him to go get Daichi without me. Shun hesitated for a second, before running to Daichi like I asked him to.

Obviously, I could not beat a jonin level shinobi, no matter how talented and mature I was, I was only seven and a genin. I knew that, Shun knew that. But Shun also knew that his fighting skill was not his forte, so instead of standing here with no help to the battle at all, he might as well go and find Daichi, and gave me a chance to maybe hold back the jonin, before Akira-sensei could finish up the other one and come back.

I had no idea if I could, even with the sharingan deciphering his every move, it was useless if I couldn't counter it fast enough with enough strength. He retracted his blade and struck down again, this time toward my waist. I flickered away quickly to a meter behind him in the nick of time, but he was smart enough to duck when I swung my sword and launch a counter attack by kicking my sword arm. I knew there's no way I could retract my arm fast enough, or to body flicker away as my position was all wrong. So instead, I twirled the sword around and lined the flat of my blade against my fragile little arm. Chakra rushed to the arm to enhance its durability, when his leg struck down I still felt a searing pain, but there was no cracking sound, so whatever material the sword was, it absorbed the worst impact.

The shinobi seemed surprised that my arm did not break when he retracted his leg. The moment his leg left my blade, I threw the blade to my left hand and lowered my body. I slashed his leg in an attempt to hinder his movement and get away.

I was naive if I thought it'd ever work, the shinobi just mocked me by side stepping away. The moment it failed, I realized that I was doomed, my position was low, and he could easily catch me by bringing his sword down. I was sure that it would hit, no second chances anymore.

An unexpected turn of an event happened, just as his sword was about to strike down, it stopped in mid air as he looked to his left in horror. A blade was sticking into his side chest cavity, half of the blade was stuck inside him. The blood from the entry wound spat out and smeared my face, but it didn't stop me from seeing a figure wearing a mysterious animal mask resembling a dog. Anbu… my thought registered, remembering what Shisui told me.

I should have let them handle the things and move away, this was not a battle I should fight. However, seeing Daichi's chest pierced by the blade, an irrational rage surged in me. It's all their fault! I screamed inside, as I stepped up and grabbed his arm. One hand on his shoulder and the other hand - still holding the tantō - grabbed his elbow. Then I twisted, hearing the familiar crack and scream as his shoulder was dislocated by my chakra enhanced force. Shoulder joint was already a weak spot, and this shinobi was definitely not putting protecting his shoulder as his priority right now seeing there was a blade sticking into his side.

He dropped his sword as his right arm slumped, but I wasn't finished. Just like what I practiced, but this time, with a real human and a real blade. My right hand grabbed onto his shoulder despite the pain from earlier, and I jumped. Using his leg as a launching point, I pivoted my body around his torso while grabbing onto his shoulder. The moment I arrived behind him, I slammed my knee into his spine with a swift motion, feeling the pain of impact on my knee and his loud gasp.

I wasn't finished, the point of this attack lies in the blade. I didn't even hesitate as I plunged my blade into the back of his neck and pushed it up his skull with all my might. The blade penetrated his neck like butter, even though it did not went very far against his skull, I was sure it destroyed his brain stem. When I pulled out the blade, there wasn't even a lot of blood gushing out, but the man's body slumped down, there was no way he was surviving this. The Anbu agent by his side already retracted his blade the moment I pulled out mine. He was looking at me. That didn't matter, he didn't matter, all that mattered was…

I ran to where Daichi fell off, and saw him slumped in Shun's arm. I saw the pool of blood under his body, it dyed the forest ground and Shun's clothes red as he was trying to stop the bleeding.

"It's no good, Maiko, I can still feel his weak heartbeat, but I can't stop the bleeding. I think the blade went through his chest!" Shun said in a panic, at this point, he put Daichi on the ground and tried to stop the bleeding from his chest by pressing on the wound.

"Damn it!" I cursed as I pulled strip of clothes from my vest and helped Shun applied pressure on the wound. None of us were medic, and we had no idea how to use healing chakra. What about the Anbu? "Please, is anyone a medic here?" I yelled as I scrambled to keep the blood from flowing, but no one responded, where's Akira-sensei? With Anbu's help, he should have already done fighting! Unless, there were more enemy…

"Crap! I can't feel his heartbeat anymore, there is no pulse!" Shun screamed, obviously too shocked about what to do next. Daichi's life was slipping away, right under our hands.

I immediately started CPR, I rhythmically compressed his chest, in an attempt to get his heart keep on beating, but the blood just kept on flowing. It's his heart that was damaged, a part of me knew that, unless he was able to receive cardiac surgery immediately, there was no way to save him. Yet, I kept on going.

I didn't know how long I was doing the CPR, but I kept going until there was no more sound of fighting anymore; until my arm was sore from the hard compressions,;until I feel any warmth in Daichi's body slipped away under my fists. But I kept on going.

I felt a hand resting on my shoulder, urging me to stop, "Stop it Maiko, he's gone." Akira-sensei said in a solemn voice, but all I could hear was desperation.

"Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!" I slammed my fist onto his chest, "Wake up, you idiot! Make your heart beat!" I screamed hysterically, but there was no one to respond, even the blood stopped running.

It was natural for humans to blame others for unfortunate events, but who could I blame? The Kirigakure shinobis? They were all dead. The Anbu? It's them who chased the Kiri-nin but failed to kill them before they reached us. But it was their job and there was no guarantee they could do better. Besides, Anbu was probably not healing oriented, they couldn't help Daichi even if they tried. Akira-sensei? He was only one person, and he was protecting all of us. Myself? That's just stupid and irresponsible, people blamed themselves and lived their lives in a stupor, not accomplishing anything and couldn't even repent themselves.

 _So was that it? Daichi just died because of bad luck? He just died for no particular reason but being in the wrong place at the wrong time?_

 _Oh life, you are so cruel…_

* * *

Leave a review if you feel like it!


	5. Chapter 5 - Hollow

A/N: Chapter 5 is here! I promised myself that I will finish one more chapter before the school starts, and I am right on time!

Beta'd by Alice J, my beautiful friend ^_^ Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 5 - Hollow

Third Person POV - The Hound

He was sure that they could catch up to the Kiri-nins in just a few minutes. There were only four Anbu, but five Kiri-nins, who were injured and battered. It would take a few minutes, but they would definitely be able to eliminate them once they caught up to them.

That's why it was so unexpected when he sensed four more presences in front of the Kiri-nins. The outpost patrol? But it's over an hour of traveling inland from the outpost, they should only be patrolling the border. More enemy? Maybe, if that's the case, then their mission would be more troublesome than he imagined.

His team was fully expected to fight nine enemies, but instead, he saw a kid falling down from the branches. A kid, a Konoha genin most likely. That was a situation he did not predict. The kid was free falling into the ground with a stab wound in his chest… the Kiri-nin… He saw the Kiri-nin engaged in battle with another elder Shinobi, he was a jōnin, most likely the genin team leader. With a dreadful thought, he realized what that meant: there were two more genins around in the area.

Without hesitation, he signaled his team to accelerate to the best of the abilities to catch up to the remaining four Kiri-nins, hoping that they could make it on time.

Just like he suspected, he saw a boy running furiously to catch the fallen boy in his arm. Then he saw a girl, younger than both boys, locked in a battle with one of the Kiri-nins. That's not good, she won't be able to last again a jonin level shinobi. Immediately, he dashed toward the battle.

He must admit, the girl was very good for her age. Her movements were fast and smart, she used her small size to maneuver around the target, and her handling of tantō was fluid, especially the exchange between two hands. However, her size and age put her at such a huge disadvantage, even her speed won't save her. Suddenly he saw a familiar flash of red eyes with black tomoes. No wonder, she was an Uchiha.

He rushed to the scene and chose to strike at the exact moment when the Kiri-nin was fixated on the girl. He pierced the Kiri-nin's side just as he was about to struck his sword down. The sword halted the impending danger for the girl, but it let a gush of red out of the wound. Hound let the familiar red liquid smeared his body, it was a common occurrence after all. He was fully expecting the girl to scream in fear or run away the moment the blood smeared her face. He was mistaken.

The blood didn't even faze the girl, instead, Hound saw a flash of anger and hatred so common in the Uchiha Sharingan. He was stunned as he watched the girl brutally dislocate the Kiri-nin's arm and then ruthlessly stabbed the back of his neck. That, was a killing blow; the Kiri-nin would never be able to survive a strike that so accurately destroyed his brain stem.

Hound didn't have time to lose, his team was engaged in battles along with the jōnin team leader, and as a mission leader, he had to be there. He quickly rushed to other battles as the Uchiha girl ran frantically toward her teammates. As he fought, he could still hear the girl yelling for help, any kind of help. He didn't move, he couldn't, his mission clearly stated that the elimination of Kiri-nin targets was their objective, but that was not the main point. The problem was, there were no one specialized in healing on his team. They were assassination and combat based team, even if he wanted to help, they wouldn't know. But if they were distracted for a second in battle, it could mean someone's life. As much as it pains him to ignore the crying help, he had to.

The battle was already in their favor, all he needed was a few more minutes. The boy, however, did not have any time left. He heard the cursing from the girl at the mention of the boy's stopped heartbeat, and he saw their jōnin instructor was frantically trying to finish the battle so he could rush to their sides. He signed his teammates to hurry up and use all they got. With one last struggle, all the targets perished. Even without the signal, all his teammates returned to the genins immediately. They were ruthless shinobis, but they were not heartless people.

It's painful to watch the small frail girl pressing down on the boy's chest with all she's got, trying to save a comrade's life and watch all your hope faded to black. He experienced that twice, and he never wanted anyone to experience that.

He wasn't sure how long he was standing there watching, the girl kept trying for a long time, counting down the beats in a sixty interval. He wanted to tell her to stop, to pull her away, but he couldn't interfere. If only he could have caught the targets earlier and eliminated them faster.

Eventually, their jōnin instructor sorrowfully stopped her from wrecking her own health. He heard her scream, and he knew his teammates were all listening to her cry couldn't say anything, they were not even the bystander, they were one of the instigators. Hound thought the girl would make a good Anbu, but now, he's not so sure she could ever get over her hate for them. Uchihas were awfully determined in that matter.

He wanted to stay and send the genins home, but they had to report to the Hokage, after all, unexpected tragedies happened on this mission. Quickly, he exchanged information with the jōnin instructor, the famous kenjutsu master, Shinbara Akira. He learned the deceased genin was called Tokugawa Daichi, as well as the rest of team six, Yamanaka Shun and Uchiha Maiko. They took Daichi's body as they left, it would be too cruel to leave it behind with the children.

Everyone who walked the Shinobi path would experience the pain of loss in some way, shape or form, he could only hope that the living wouldn't be broken by the dead.

o((*^▽^*))o

The moment I returned to the village, I ran for home. We were supposed to go for debriefing after a mission, but I didn't care and Akira-sensei didn't stop me.

I ran past mom and Sasuke in the living room and I closed my door before she got a chance to ask what's wrong. I couldn't lie to her, but I couldn't retell the story so soon.

Trauma, it was a trauma, I kept telling myself. Trauma, trauma, trauma, trauma… My eyes hurt, they stung and they automatically turned into sharingan even if I didn't wish for it. _Oh, Kami, it hurts in the heart, not the eyes_.

I was wrong, I did hate Anbu, it was irrational but I hated them for messing up everything. They reminded me so much of OLYMPUS, everything was about the mission, and everyone was expendable. But who was I to judge, I used to be one of them.

I hate that I couldn't break down in sorrow, no, not couldn't, but wouldn't. I had people I needed to protect, Itachi, Sasuke, Shisui, mom and even my teammates (but I failed him…I failed him). If I broke down, I would become weak and I everything I'd worked for would be gone. _Gosh, my eyes hurt, why are they hurting, it should be my heart! Why do they hurt more than my heart! Why does the pain in my heart fade? Is it because I'm just heartless?_

I cried. I cried miserably about Daichi's death. I waited until there were no more tears running out of my irritated eyes, and I stopped. This would be the last time I cry for Daichi, the last tear that fell for him. From now on, no more.

 _I'm so sorry Daichi. I need you to become one of the traumas, a standard obstacle I need to get past. I need you to fade, I need you to become a manageable memory. Confront and accept, confront and accept. I need to confront and accept your death so that I can move past you. I'm so sorry, really really sorry, but I couldn't honour your death the way I should, I couldn't let my heart bleed for you like I should. I am the worst…_

Eventually, nothing happened to my eyes. the pain in my eyes subsided, so did my pain for Daichi. His courageous words, his confident smile, his passionate speech… his limping body, his red blood, his stopped heartbeats. Confront and accept, they were all in the shadow now.

(◕ω◕✿)

We were called to the Hokage's office the next morning. The death of a teammate, standard procedures, the fate for team six needed to be discussed. I dressed up in black; after all, it was the last thing I could do for him. Daichi's parents banned any shinobi to attend his funeral, which was reasonable. After all, it was the shinobis who directly and indirectly caused his death.

Now that I accepted the trauma, dealt with the emotion and calmed down a bit, I noticed the dreaded atmosphere in the village. Something must have happened during our mission, but what? Well, there was the Fire Daimyo's visit, and… _Kami, I hope I'm wrong_.

I walked into Hokage's tower and waited. Shun was already there, his eyes unfocused, he was probably still mourning. I couldn't help him with that, my method was for the heartless, but Shun was not heartless, he needed to find a way for himself.

Eventually, Akira-sensei's gentle hands pushed us through the Hokage's door, and for the first time, we met the Sandaime Hokage face to face. If it was another situation, it would be an honour.

"Welcome, team six. I am deeply sorry for the tragedy that happened on your last mission. It always pains my heart to see one so young lost in the world." Sandaime said sincerely. He seemed like a genuine old man, the kind that would care for his people. But it's too early to judge, after all, in my world, all the politicians seemed so.

"However, the fate of team six must be determined. You may not know it, but recently, a major event involving the Fire Daimyo occurred in the village, and… due to some unforeseen circumstances, one of the team was recently dissolved as one genin member quit and the other… left us permanently." Sandaime said it regretfully. Beside me, Shun's eyes widened in pain. We all knew what 'left permanently' meant, no amount of euphemism could erase the pain of hearing that.

"As a result, right now, we have one genin needing a team, and team six needs a member. I've decided to let him join team six." Sandaime said, and Shun tightened his fist.

"So what, you are just going to replace Daichi?" Shun asked angrily, a rather rude but completely reasonable behaviour in the presence of Hokage, the highest power in the village. However, Sandaime did not reprimand him or show any sign of displeasure. Instead, he explained in a sorrowful voice.

"That was not my intention at all, Shun-kun. No one can replace Daichi-kun and his bravery. However, all of you lost someone dearly to you, and it was my hope that you can help each other to cope with the losses. As shinobi, we have to deal with losses, and it's our comrades that help us get by. Right now, you have Maiko-chan to share your pain, but what about him? He was the only genin left." Sandaime said calmly, and Shun's angry expression relaxed a bit.

As soon as the Hokage saw Shun's expression softened, he turned to the door and said: "Itachi-kun, you can come in now!" I probably showed more surprise than I actually felt. The door opened silently, and the familiar stoic face came into my view. As much as I guessed earlier that something had happened to Itachi's team, since it was their mission to be the escort guard, my heart still clenched for him. I suddenly understood why Sandaime decided to put us together. We might not be able to mend each other's wounds, but we at least understood each other.

"Jōnin Shinbara, they are all yours." Sandaime said as he looked at us all benevolently.

Itachi nodded at Shun, Shun stared at him and I sighed at the team dynamic. Akira-sensei seemed to notice this as well, so he said: "Come on, kids, let's get some team bonding done."

~(◡﹏◕✿)

Time Skip: [One and a Half Years Later]

 _Itachi is the worst_ , I thought as I was soaked in water. I moved along the branches quickly, if he didn't know my position earlier from Shun's sensing, then he was sure to know it now from the chakra infused wave.

I didn't even know why I bothered to hide with a sensor after me, should have gotten rid of him the first chance I got, but then I'd have to get past Itachi… right, and that's why I was hiding.

Well, no matter, I had no chance if I chose to keep hiding, maybe it's time to try that ninjutsu. I ran to the clearing in the middle of the forest, and I yelled to the surrounding, "Itachi! Get your butt down here, and let's have a fight!" Yep, all my lady-like mannerism out of the window, mom would be so proud.

What greeted me was a wave of Phoenix Sage Fire. The little fireballs followed me as I jumped around and dodged. I flung myself around the air and body flickered, letting the fire bullets crash into surrounding trees. _Come on, Shun, if you want to do it, this is the time._ Maybe Itachi's fire wasn't enough, so I did the hand seals for the Phoenix Sage Fire as well, and a flurry of fireballs shot out of my mouth, I was careful so that they'd spread out and crash into trees aimlessly.

Finally, I felt a familiar wave of chakra, heading toward me. _Getting impatient, Shun_. I thought as I let the foreign chakra wrap around me. It was Shun's Mind Body Disturbance Technique, it allowed Shun to take control of enemies' bodies. However, for some reason, he told me that my mind was especially strong, like a foreign body he couldn't penetrate. Itachi suspect that it may have something to do with my unusual Sharingan awaken time, but only I knew what's the real reason for that. _It's because I am a foreign object._

However, it did have an effect on me, like its name suggested, it disturbed my mind for a while until my own 'extra strong foreign mind' fought it off. When my mind was clear again, Itachi kneed me in the stomach, and before I could retaliate, he already grabbed me hands and pinned me on the ground facing down. His knee was on top of my neck and he held my hands down on the ground. I was sure this was a payback from before, all those good times where I cranked his spine and neck onto the hard, harsh floor.

"You are slacking, Maiko, you never should have let my technique touch you." Shun laughed in the background. _Finally, they are all out of hiding._

"We'll see about that." I smirked as Itachi eyed me suspiciously. "Itachi-nii, next time, remember that I have four limbs." I kicked my right leg up from the back, in between my toes, was a small piece of blade, but sharp and fast enough to carve a hole in his neck. Itachi moved just in time to avoid the kunai as he jumped off of me in a hurry. So instead, I raised my leg in a scorpion position and used the kunai to cut off the ninja wire Itachi placed on my hands.

I quickly jumped away from Itachi and surveyed the field. Itachi and Shun were standing about 20 meters away, looking warily at me. "Finally, I got you two out of your hiding. I am practicing something, so be good boys, and let me practice it on you." I said as I form the strings of hand seals for the ninjutsu I've been working on ever since Sasuke's attempted kidnapping.

"Raiton: Rairyu no Mai (Dance of Lightning Dragon)!" I said quietly as I extended my palm. Two surges of icy blue chakra shot out of each of my palms, they were long and slim like the shape of dragons, and they fizzled and shimmered like electricity. Itachi and Shun's faces widened in shock as two surges of lightning dragon shot for each of them.

The lightning really danced around in the arena, but as I tried to control the direction, the longer they were moving around, the harder it was to move them, especially since I was trying to control four lightning dragons. I accelerated one lightning dragon and willed it to crash into the ground near Shun. The lightning blasted a one-meter hole on the ground. It's not like I was trying to kill him.I dropped another one near his feet, and the blast sent him flying. He wouldn't be up for a while, especially since my lightning dragon contained paralysis effect.

Now moving on to Itachi, and he was a pain. My lightning dragons were fast, enough to catch up to most genin's or even lower chunin's body flicker, but then again, Itachi learned from Shisui, and he kept on changing directions as if he knew that willing the dragons to change directions in fast speed would cost me more chakra. _Right, he had sharingan that could see chakra._

My chakra supply was closer and closer to being depleted. The ninjutsu was already costing me a lot of chakras to use, and it was only because of my Sharingans that I was able to control four at a time, which meant that my chakra was being drained at an even faster rate. I dropped one lightning dragon on him, knowing full well that he could dodge it. That lightning dragon punched a hole into the tree he was standing on a fraction of a second ago. I focused my remaining chakra into the last lightning dragon. I willed it to follow Itachi as best as I could, and in the end, I could feel keenly that my chakra store was close to empty. I bit my lips in frustration, the speed of my lightning were getting slower and there was no way it could catch him. Finally, I accelerated the lightning one more time and sent it right at Itachi.

After the smoke cleared, it revealed a one-meter crater on the training ground, but Itachi was nowhere in sight. I sighed as my sharingan deactivated because of lack of chakra and I threw my hands in the air and said, "I give, my chakra is depleted. And Itachi is still here somewhere."

Akira-sensei, who only reappeared recently, blew the whistle. A second later, Itachi appeared behind a tree and Shun walked toward us awkwardly as he tried to shake off the paralysis effect.

"What the hell was that? Are you trying to kill me!" Shun complained. But I just gave him a passive look.

"I set the damage to low, I think, so I can have better control. It's not going to kill you, I think." Shun face palmed at my careless words.

"Now now, Maiko, can you please explain the ninjutsu, I'm sure all of us are curious." Akira-sensei suggested and I nodded.

"That is Raiton: Rairyu no Mai, Dance of Lightning Dragon. I started developing it about one and a half years ago, and I've only recently succeeded in it without blowing myself up." I explained, "It's basically lightning 'whips' that have high speed and high piercing power. It contains paralysis effect if the target is either struck by it directly or was within its basting range, although the effect will be weaker if it's an indirect hit. However, it does contain some problems that I need to work on."

"First of all, it costs a lot of chakras for me to use it. Secondly, the more lightning dragons I need to control, the harder it is. Right now, my limit is four without it going crazy, and that's only accomplishable with the help of sharingan. Of course, activating sharingan didn't really help with the chakra either." I paused for a second before continuing.

"Thirdly, the longer I need to control it, the harder it is to move it around, especially if I need to change direction or accelerating it rapidly. In order to keep up the ninjutsu, my chakra was depleted even more, as Itachi kindly took advantage of." I gave Itachi a glare but he just pretended that he didn't saw it.

There was a moment of silence before Itachi spoke up, "I believe those problems you can solve by constant practicing. But in the meantime, working as a team could temporarily solve those issues. From what I gathered, if the target is slowed or immobile, then the jutsu would have caused great damage. Shun's mind-body techniques are perfect for that. Normally, I would recommend you casting a genjutsu before using the lightning ninjutsu, however seeing that you need sharingan for the control, I should cast the genjutsu for you." Itachi calmly analyzed, and I listened carefully. I smiled at the mention of teamwork, it seemed that he was really incorporated into the team.

"Amazing, the great Itachi decide to play support for me, I must be getting lucky." I couldn't help but tease at my brother's serious face.

"Hey, I'm amazing and great as well, so be honoured that you get support from the great Shun!" Shun yelled angrily, but I could hear the playfulness in his voice.

"Of course, Shun-sama, although you may want to get that twitching in your hand looked at." I chuckled as he rapidly shook his hand trying to get the paralysis off faster.

"It's not my fault that the two of your are monsters, think about how normal people feel with the two for you around, I should have a medal for that!" Shun said exasperatedly, and I continued to laugh while Itachi just stared at us both emotionlessly.

"I believe you guys are finally ready for this." Akira-sensei spoke up as he handed us three pieces of paper. I looked at the paper and realized that it was an application for Chūnin Exam.

"The only reason I didn't let you guys took the previous exams was because I initially thought the team was too new for that. But after this practice, I could honestly say that you guys are ready as a team. The next Chūnin Exam is at Sunagakure in a month, I wish all of you good luck!" Akira-sensei explained. It was true that at the beginning, there was discord among the three of us, however, after the team training, we were able to work very well as a team. Itachi was most skilled at long range projectiles and ninjutsu as well as genjutsus, I was most formidable at close ranged combat with my own taijutsu style and kenjutsu, and Shun was the prime support and sensor of the group with his mind based attacks and sensory abilities, he even went out his ways to learn basic medical jutsus after Daichi's demise.

"Bring the filled out application to me tomorrow and that's it for today!" That's the last thing he said before he disappeared.

"So this is it, we are going to become Chūnins." Shun said wishfully.

"Only if we pass." Itachi, being Itachi, just had to state the unpleasant fact.

"Then we just have to pass then. Any objections?" I asked. Of course, there weren't any, we were ready for this, to advance to the next step of our lives.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

Itachi and I went home together after the practice. The moment we stepped into the door, Sasuke crashed into us and gave us a hug.

"Nee-chan, Nii-chan, you are back!" Sasuke said excitedly. He will be four soon, seeing that I've just turned nine, meaning his birthday will be a little more than a month away. By the time we were back from Chūnin exam, he will be four.

"Play with me! Please!" I had no idea when did Sasuke learn the puppy eyes, but he was good at it.

"Okay, Sasuke, whatever you want." I said to him with a smile, the little brother I tried so hard to protect. A moment later, Father walked into the living room.

"Father, Maiko and I have been nominated for the Chūnin exam in Sunagakure next month." Itachi informed our father who showed a pleased smile.

"It's about time, go pass with flying colours. Itachi, Maiko, you are both the pride of our family. You need to do some extra preparation for the exam. Meet me at the training ground in five minutes." Father told us and left quickly.

"Aww, does that mean you and Nii-chan can't play with me?" Sasuke looked at me with his sad round eyes, staring at me and Itachi with betrayal.

"Sorry, Sasuke, but Mai and I have training sessions with Father." Itachi answered, "but next time for sure." he poked Sasuke's forehead as he pouted. Suddenly, Sasuke seemed flustered and he quickly ran off.

I sighed at Sasuke's little temper tantrum, as we grew older, we rarely had time to play with him as we juggle our team training and the Uchiha family training. It's no wonder he's mad at us.

Suddenly I felt mother's hand on my shoulder, she said to me sweetly: " Don't worry too much, he will understand when he gets older. Now, remember our little promises about Chūnin, so go work hard, mom believes in you!"

I nodded and gave her a smile before I went to gather my supplies for the training.

The next day, all three of turned in the Chūnin exam applications and we were told by Akira-sensei to meet at the village two weeks from now for the journey to Sunagakure.

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

Third Person POV - The Hound

Hound arrived in the Hokage's office in a flash immediately after being summoned. He knelt down before the Hokage and reported "Hokage-sama, Anbu Hound reporting."

"Ah, Anbu Hound, I have a mission for you, but first, please take off the mask, Hatake-kun." The Hokage ordered, and Hound obeyed. He took off his mask and revealed a face that was covered with the mask from the nose and down. One of his eyes was closed with a scar over it, and the wild silver hair completed the picture.

"Hatake Kakashi-kun, I want you to escort the genins to the Sunagakure and oversee their safety for the chunin exam" Hound - or rather Kakashi - twitched at the mission assignment. Anbu escort for genins to the Chunin exam? Didn't they have jonins for that? Besides, sending Anbu to another village often meant intentions of conflict.

"I know you must be thinking of why would I send an Anbu to a simple escort? But I don't plan to send you as Anbu, but rather, as Jonin Hatake." The Hokage explained as Kakashi's eye widened. When was the last time he used his real name on a mission? When was the last time he walked in the light?

"I know you want to know why the genins need an Anbu escort of your level. Take a look at this." The Hokage handed him two pieces of reports. Kakashi opened the first one, it's a report on one of the genin participants.

The first thing that surprised him was the overall stats, at the age of ten, he already gained the total stats of 25 out of 40, with an overwhelming 3.5 for both genjutsu and ninjutsu, a 3 for taijutsu and a surprising 4 for intelligence. He paused for a second before opening the second file, his eyes widened again after seeing the name: Uchiha Maiko, the girl who's teammate was killed by the Kiri-nin. He looked again, age: nine, even younger than Uchiha Itachi, but her total stats was 23 out of 40, Taijutsu: 3.5, Ninjutsu: 3, Genjutsu: 2, Intelligence: 4, Speed: 3.5. Those are the data of genius, to think that they would appear in this time of peace.

"As you can see, their talents rivals yours, and maybe even more talented than you. Itachi-kun was dubbed as the most talented Uchiha in the century, Maiko-chan, she was said to awaken her sharingan at birth, a legendary feat that has never happened before. Together, they are said to be the two prodigies of the century." The Hokage narrated, and Kakashi was again in shock at the revelation. Sharingan at birth? Is that even possible? The sharingan feeds on emotional trauma to awaken, so how was a newborn child, with no life experience or cognition, able to awaken it?

"Impossible as it might seem, there's no question that they are valuable assets for the village, their future could secure the strength of our village. Besides, they are the children of Uchiha Fugaku, the current Uchiha head. The current relation with Uchiha is tense, if something were to happen to their most prized children, then I have no idea how the situation will worsen. Sunagakure had never been on the best terms with Konoha, so there's no guarantee that they won't try something to weaken Konoha's power. I need you, Kakashi of the Sharingan, to use your reputation to intimidate them, and also to protect those two at all costs. Konoha cannot endure another civil war." Hokage-sama explained in details, and Kakashi listened closely. Even though he worked in the dark, he more or less understood the tension in the village.

"Will you accept the mission? Konoha will be sending two teams this time, and you will be following Team six as a second instructor along with Jōnin Shinbara Akira if you choose to accept it." Hokage-sama asked.

"Of course, Hokage-sama, I will surely complete the mission." Kakashi bowed again. The order came from Sandaime Hokage, there was no way he could refuse. He wondered if that girl still hated the Anbu. _Of course, she does, one just doesn't simply forget the loss of their first teammate_.

* * *

Kakashi is here! Chunin Exam is here! So get excited dattebayo! (yeah, that was totally me stealing Naruto's catch phrase, but some one has to say it since Naruto is currently around three to four, a wee little toddler just like the pre-revengeful-teenager Sasuke)

Anyway, please leave a review if you feel like it!


	6. Chapter 6 - Camaraderie

A/N: So school started, and my first week back is hectic. But here is the new chapter, Chunin exam part one. Thank you guys for all the follows and favourites and reviews, I am so flattered by them! the next chapter will probably be out in a week, so stay tuned. Also, now that I have a consistent flow of the story, I promise that each chapter will not be shorter than 5000 words, and for the majority of times, it would probably be around 5500 - 6500 words per chapter.

Beta'd by the fantastic Alice J (AliceJ: Who is also awesome and fantastic and - *pushed into a well by a highly stressed author*)

* * *

Chapter 6 - Camaraderie

Two weeks passed in a flash when you were constantly training. I arrived at the village gates with Itachi, seeing another slightly older team already gathered at the gates.

"Maiko, Itachi, finally, I thought for once that the two perfect little shinobi overslept." Shun yelled at us and waved. I looked over, seeing the familiar sight of Shun's orange hair and Akira-sensei's sandy hair. However, I failed to recognize the sight of the silver haired jonin beside those two. No, I had a feeling I'd seen him somewhere, but it's so fleeting that I couldn't remember it at all.

"Shut up, Shun, we are right on time." I retorted, it's usually just me and Shun bickering, Itachi was too bored to join us.

"Manners, Maiko, we have company. Don't want to ruin your perfect lady image so soon." Shun pointed to his left toward the silver-haired stranger.

"I guess I should introduce you guys." Akira-sensei said as he turned toward the stranger, "Everyone, this is Jonin Hatake Kakashi, he will be accompany our team to the Sunagakure, he will be acting as a second instructor for Team six, as he was preparing to take on a genin team soon. Now the three of you can introduce yourself." I eyed the jonin - Hatake Kakashi, I couldn't read his emotions, nor his micro-facial expression. Lies, lies, lies, this whole thing reeked of lies. After four years with Akira-sensei, I could tell his micro-facial expression very well. When he was explaining, it wasn't natural, but there were no sign of coercion or numbness, which means he was doing it willingly.

"Yamanaka Shun, sensor." Shun was the first to start.

"Uchiha Itachi, long range." Itachi said.

"Uchiha Maiko, close combat." I have no idea why we were explaining our role, it's not like we were defined by it. But since both Shun and Itachi went with it, I might as well roll with it. A small part of me registered this as one of Shun's plot, he was cunningly smart, fooling people with his deceptive plans.

"Hatake Kakashi, please to meet you all. I will be acting kinda like teaching assistant to Akira-senpai, so if you have any questions, please feel free to ask." He said calmly. I still couldn't shake off the feeling that I've seen him from somewhere, maybe even just a back shadow.

"Well, plenty of time to get to know each other on the way. For now, let's depart, it's going to be a long journey." Akira-sensei stopped us as if he could sense the tension building in the air.

The journey into Suna would take at least a week for us Genins, so we set up tents during the night. Since we had five people in team six, us three genins were forced to share a tent while our two teachers shared the next one.

"Are you sure you had never heard of him? Kakashi of the Sharingan, ring any bells? The copy ninja Kakashi?" Shun looked at me unbelievably as we got ready to sleep for the day.

"Sharingan? That's interesting. But no, it doesn't ring any bell." I said to him nonchalantly.

"I heard his presence disappeared for a few years after the end of the Third Shinobi War. But even now his reputation is still memorable." Shun continued.

"Disappeared, huh, that sounds sketchy… I'm going out for a second, you guys sleep." I said to them as I went out of the tent. I really hated uncertainty, so there's something I needed to check.

We were still in the forest region of Fire Country, one could barely see the shine of moon past the thick leaves. How ironic, for such a land, with all the fighting it went through, never seemed to lose its serenity.

I quickly identified the target, the silver haired jonin was standing by the tree, looking bored as always. One of his eyes was hidden by his hitai-ate, it's safe to assume that it's his sharingan.

"Ah, can't sleep, Uchiha-kun? You should really rest before tomorrow's journey, we will be advancing into the desert soon." Kakashi looked at me perceptively.

"I just have a few questions about lightning ninjutsu, didn't you say that we could ask you questions anytime? Hatake-sensei." I spoke the last few words slowly as if mocking his pretense.

"Of course, ask away." He smiled tensely, and I gave him one of those innocent fake smiles. I'm sure he could see through it if his sharingan was not for show.

"I have trouble controlling the chakra I'm sending out in my jutsu. For example, I have a lightning jutsu that requires remote control, let's say I just want to paralyze someone, but I couldn't be sure that I won't kill him." I said perfectly calmly. It's not all bullshit, and I couldn't feel the strength of my lightning dragon once it left my palm.

"Ah, common problem. That's why we tried to contact and control our lightning jutsu rather than use it as a projectile. I would like to see your jutsu, but I'd assume that it would be flashy. So for now, you should try to practice by keeping it to your body and get used to the lightning chakra outage before you shoot them off. The more you use the jutsu, the more you should be able to feel the connection even if you are not in contact with it. But for now, I assume you want to use it by the time of the Chunin exam, the best way is to be sure of the chakra amount before hand so that you won't have to worry about it once it leaves your body." Kakashi of the Sharingan explained. I thought about it, everything he said seemed to make sense, well, theoretically speaking, it's not like I hadn't tried it before. But with the short time I was able to keep the lightning in my palm before letting it loose, the progress was slow.

"Well, thank you, Hatake-sensei, after all, we don't want to cause any accidental deaths, do we." I said with a innocent tone, honestly, I didn't know why I said that, it seemed like I was suggesting something. It's just that feeling I couldn't shake off, a subconscious feeling that I couldn't make sense of, I saw him before… _in blood_ …

"No problem, I would like to see that Lightning jutsu of yours sometimes, after all, not everyone starts by learning the lightning nature ninjutsu." He said with perfect calmness. There wasn't any hint on his face (although I could only see an eye) that I could use to interpret meaning.

"You will, don't worry, team six will put on a show." I said quietly as I walked back to the tent, not sure if he heard that or not.

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

We arrived at Sunagakure just in time for the exam. Being one of the larger villages, the exam had a lot of participants. Most of them are from Suna, and the rest from Iwa, Kumo and Kiri. There were maybe one team each from some of the smaller villages such as Grass or Waterfall.

We all gathered in one of the major halls in the village. Our Jonin instructors left for their own gathering, leaving the genin students to finish the exam.

"Everyone, Listen! The first stage of the exam will begin right now." One of the Suna Proctor yelled from second floor. "In this stage, you will be tested on your skill in information gathering and interrogation." I narrowed my eyes at the mention of interrogation. Usually, the stage one of Chunin exam was paper tests, however, the village hosting it was allowed to determine their own method as long as it was approved by the other villages participating.

"You will enter the exam in teams of three, all of you will be given a list of information that describes the time, place and method of attack on one of the significant places in Sunagakure. The information will be different for each team." The Proctor explained.

"One member of each team will be the prisoner, who will be interrogated by another team, who in turn will hand one prisoner for that team to interrogate. No physical harm is allowed, or you will be disqualified. The other two will act as interrogators, and will have access to a pair of Chakra restraining handcuff." No physical harm, that meant the main way of interrogating will rely on psychological tactic, mind invasion and genjutsu.

"Each team will be given a paper to fill out the information gathered from the enemy team. You get one try to hand in the correct information. The session stops when one of the two teams hand in the information sheet, if the information is correct, then that team gets to pass and the other team will fail. If the information is incorrect, then both teams fails. If the time exceeds 30 minutes for both teams, both teams fails. Don't think about forgetting the information so you can't remember it, after your team hands in the information sheets, all of you will need to hand in a separate sheet one by one stating the original plan of your team, if you get it wrong, your team fails." The instructions are clear, basically, get the right information before the other team. All's fair except for physical harm, meaning there's no limit to psychological trauma.

"You have five minutes to discuss among yourselves and assign the role of prisoner and interrogators. After that, you will all line up to receive your attack plan." The proctor said before leaving the room. Immediately, the room was filled with whispers.

"Shun will be one of the interrogators, that's for sure. His mind invasion techniques are useful for this situation." I said immediately, Shun and Itachi nodded.

"Now we just have to determine which one of us will be the prisoner. Logically speaking, genjutsu will be the most likely method used for interrogation, and I have a higher tolerance for genjutsu than Mai." Itachi added.

"It's true that you have a better tolerance than me, but wouldn't you have a better chance at using genjutsu to find out the information? I can hold my own if that's what you are worried about. They might even underestimate me because of my age." I proposed, and both Shun and Itachi thought about it in silence.

"That may be true, but we might need your skill in facial cue analysis just in case genjutsu or mind invasion techniques won't work. Also, being underestimated is not a good thing in this situation, since your chakra will be sealed, they won't hold back if they think you are weak." Itachi analyzed, I thought about it and couldn't help agreeing to it. He might have had some thoughts about keeping me safe, but the case present itself clearly, he clearly will have more advantages than me being the prisoner.

"Then it's all set, Itachi will be the prisoner while Maiko and I will be the interrogator." Shun concluded.

Soon the discussion time was over, and team after team was send in the closed area to get their information. Our team went in the tent soon, and we received a piece of paper. We looked at it quickly and remember the details, Time: 1530, Place: Central Trading building, Method: bombing. Quickly, I burned the paper as soon as all of us remembered the details.

The next thing we know, we were placed in a small cell with a Iwa genin bound with Chakra-retraining handcuffs. There was a clock ticking behind him, and it showed exactly 29 minutes and 48 second left. I could only assume the situation was the same with Itachi and start the interrogation, the sooner we finish up here, the faster he could be freed.

' _Maiko, can you hear me?'_ I heard Shun's voice in my head it must be his mind communication technique. ' _Yes,'_ I sent the thought back to him, ' _Please try the mind invasion technique.'_

Quickly, he formed the special seal for mind invasion. He closed his eyes and stayed concentrated for a while. Then his body shook and he opened his eyes. 'His mind is strong, not as strong as yours, but still hard to penetrate. I could get partial information, but not all of it.'

I stared at the Iwa genin. He seemed fully awake now from the attempt by Shun. He stared at us with venomous eyes, and he spatted: "Try all you want, but you can't crack my mind!" really, agitate your interrogator so soon, he really did not know how to keep calm.

' _Watch for my cue, and then do everything you can to get the method and time, I'll take care of the place.'_ I thought to Shun and he nodded. Quickly I activated my sharingan in a flash. I stared straight into the Iwa genin's eyes, letting my red eyes envelop his mind and body. His eyes turned dull at under the effect of my Vertigo Genjutsu. Shun moved immediately and moved his hand on his head and closed his eyes in concentration.

When he opened his eyes again, he looked tired and exhausted. He stepped away from the now conscious and furious Iwa genin. "Time is 0725, and method is mass destruction ninjutsu. I couldn't get the place." He whispered to me, I could tell he worked hard and used all he got, his forehead was full of sweat and he couldn't even keep up with the mind communication technique.

"Good job, I'll take it from here." I patted him on the shoulder and walked passed him toward the Iwa genin. I ignored his cursing and instead stared into his eyes. I put so much negative emotions into this jutsu that if I put anymore I would feel overwhelmed as well. Soon, the Iwa-nin's eyes widened in fear, I have no idea what he was seeing, but I could tell from his scream of terror that it was not something pleasant. This was my strongest genjutsu, the Hell Bind Genjutsu, It's hard to use and it requires eye contact at my level. Itachi would have done a better job, but since he's not here, mine would have to do.

I stopped the genjutsu after a minute. When the Iwa-nin was aware of the reality, I was sitting in front of him and staring into his eyes with my red sharingan intensely.

"Now that you know what I could make you feel, let's talk about it." I said calmly, letting the coldness of my voice sink in.

"Shut up, you can't do anything to me, or you will be disqualified." He retorted, but I could already see the slight trembling in his voice as well as the tensing of his neck muscles.

"There are more ways to break your mind than you could imagine without leaving a mark on your body. I mean I could just let you experience what you felt earlier some more." I smiled at him chillingly. I saw the spec of sweat gathering on his face. _Good, now I knew his reaction, I should begin._

"Let's start easy, time, tell me the time." I said, staring coldly into his eyes. Shun already knew the time, but he didn't need to know that. "Is it morning?" I saw a slight tense in the muscle near his neck, telling me he was swallowing the saliva due to being nervous, but I continued, "Or is it afternoon?" His tense muscle relaxed a bit, and his mouth opened slightly. "Answer me!" I yelled, hey, I need to put on an act. He refused to say anything, so I gave him another icy smile. Tomoes spinning, soon, he was screaming again and hyperventilating due to the genjutsu. I didn't really need to do this, but I had to put on the impression that my main way of interrogation was genjutsu.

When he calmed down again, I stared at him again. "Let's try something else, how about places, tell me the place." Now I was getting into the main event. The reason why I ask Shun to focus on method and time was because there were so much more possible answers than places. The Proctor specifically said that the attacks are for significant places in Suna, and according to my research before I came to here, there really weren't that many. Besides, the attacking method was mass destruction ninjutsu, commonly, we wouldn't use that for stone sculptures or historical sites. Which meant, the place was more likely to be major buildings in the village with concentrated population, and that narrows the places down to Commercial Centre, Kazekage's office, Shinobi Operation Centre, and Academy.

"Places, I asked, unless you want to experience hell again." I said coldly, the Iwa-nin gave me a despised look, but he managed to whisper "Kazekage's office". I stared at his face, his eyes looked down for a second, and his fidgeting stopped, his lips tightened and closed off immediately. _Liar, you are getting defensive_. At least I could get rid of that option on my list.

"Really, you don't look certain, are you sure you are not getting it confused with other places, like Shinobi Operation center, they seemed to be quite similar." I asked harshly, noticing his pupil widened a bit, and his neck muscle tightened in an attempt to swallow his saliva. _Jackpot._

"I swear, it's Kazekage's office, just stop the genjutsu." he said quickly, voice faster than before. _Trying so hard to redirect my attention_ , I thought.

"You seemed awfully tough before, what changed your mind. You could be lying for all I know, it could be the Commercial Center, the Academy or even the Great Sand Dune for all I know." I asked, intentionally flared up my voice, but his muscles relaxed as I listed the places even if my voices sounded harsher, and that's all the confirmation I need.

"I'm not lying, I just want out!" He screamed one more time, faking the distress in his voice.

"Good try, but sorry." I said as his eyes widened, for one more time, I put him in the Hell Bind Genjutsu.

"It's Shinobi Operation Office, I'm sure of it." I said to Shun as the Iwa-genin was a bit preoccupied with illusions of suffering. Shun nodded to me as he filled out the sheets with the information we gathered. Then, I dispelled the genjutsu before pressing the alarm that suggest we finished interrogation.

One examiner opened the cell and looked inside, the Iwa-nin was a bit confused and unconcentrated, but otherwise, he seemed perfectly 'healthy'. There won't be any permanent damage, the effect wasn't that strong as I only put him through the genjutsu for a short period of time. Trust me when I say that mine was nothing compare to what Itachi could do, he was just a kinder person than me. The examiner looked at the timer, only 7 minutes and 43 second have passed, then he collected our information sheet before giving us each another to fill in our own information.

Shun and I wrote down the information quickly before the proctor lead us to a neutral room. Soon, the other two Iwa-nin and Itachi arrived in the room as well. The proctor ordered the return of all prisoners, and we obeyed. Itachi seemed fine, if anything, he seemed bored, just looking at the furious expression of the remaining two Iwa genins showed that they weren't happy with Itachi nor with the treatment of their slightly dazed teammate.

The proctor checked the information sheet we handed them with careful inspections and then opened up another file to compare the answers. After an unnecessarily long time, the proctor finally looked up.

"The Konoha team successfully obtained the information correctly, and thus they passed the first stage. The Iwa team failed and thus will be asked to leave the village. The Konoha team can return to their hotels and rest for the night. Please come to the village gates again tomorrow at 0700 to participate the second stage." The proctor said in an emotionless voice, and then we were escorted out of the facility.

We walked back to the hotel we were admitted in, and we found Akira-sensei and Hatake Kakashi in the lobbying, obviously waiting for us.

"Did you pass the interrogation? This exam seemed to be especially hard." Akira-sensei asked without a trace of worry in his voice.

"Of course sensei, have some faith in us." Shun said and Akira-sensei smiled at us.

"I assume you and Maiko were the interrogators?" Akira-sensei asked.

"Of course, I know how much you hate Maiko when she caught you making excuses. Besides, I think she broke our prisoner." Shun teased as Akira-sensei winced.

"I did not break him. All of his bones were still intact when I left him." I said innocently, obviously, we have different ideas about what "broken" meant. Akira-sensei sighed again, and Kakashi just stared at us like some strange specimens.

"Alright, I get it, you did your thing. Now, you guys should go rest, the second stage is tomorrow and you guys need to be full of energy." Akira-sensei suggested and we all nodded. The second stage was usually survival, so it would make sense for us to prepare ourselves by conserving energy. Quickly, we ate our meals and went back to the rooms

(◕ω◕✿)

Amazing enough, there seemed to be a man made training field just outside of the village that wasn't there a day ago. As much as I want to gape at the intricate designs of sand maze, I didn't want to look like a idiot.

Apparently, only 23 out of 52 teams managed to pass the first round, the exam was brutally shaving off people right from the start. Right now, all the genins were staring intensely at the proctor of the second exam as he explained the rules.

"Stage two will be based on survival games. Each team will be given a piece of paper as your identification. In order to pass, each team will have to acquire three piece of paper, one for each member. Only if you obtain the required paper and get out of the sand maze within a day, you are qualified for the third round." The proctor said as Suna-nins in charge of the exams handed each team a piece of paper with second stage seemed very straightforward, almost too simple compared to the first round. However, if each team only got one piece of paper, then at most there will be seven team passing.

"Now, the second stage starts." He said loudly as soon as every team had a piece of paper. Suddenly, the Suna-nins around us started forming hand seals, and before we knew it, we were swallowed up by waves of sands rising from the ground. Itachi and Shun reacted immediately, they grabbed my arm and stayed close to make sure we weren't separated in the sand. It's obvious that this is how we would be transported to the maze, so we won't find out the exit by retracing our steps. By the time the sand quiet down, we seemed to be underground, inside a sand cavern.

"What a flashy show they put on, trying to show their power to the other villages?" Shun said as we surround the area.

"That's none of our concern, can you sense anything, Shun?" Itachi asked, and Shun immediately closed his eyes and concentrated. After a while, he shook his head and said: "The sand maze seems to be blocking my sensor, but I can sense up to 50 meter in diameter, and there's no other team near us in that distance."

"So what's our plan, go find other teams and attack?" Shun asked, and I thought about it for a while,

"The real problem is how do we get out. Obviously, other teams will find us even if we don't move. But we do not know the exit to the sand maze." I analyzed. The Proctor said to collect three pieces of paper and get out, but we have no direction as to how to get out, which meant…

"The paper." Both Itachi and I said at the same time. Immediately, Itachi took out the piece of paper we were given, he held it out and let us observe it.

"It seemed to have some kind of seal on it. But it's incomplete, since the lines are cut off." Itachi said as he observed. The scribble of lines did not make any sense to me, since I didn't study fuinjutsu. However, it does make sense that the shape was incomplete, it was cut neatly in a straight line.

"Then we probably need to collect paper that complete this seal in order to get out. Looks like we can't just get any three papers" I said grimly, this was already getting harder, even if we manage to get two more piece that complete the seal, none of us knew anything about fuinjutsu except that it's fuinjutsu, so if we were required to do something about the seal, we would have nowhere to began.

"Either way, we need to start by getting the papers. This team needs a leader in charge, and I propose Itachi." I said. All three of us were capable shinobis, but if we were to attack multiple teams, we need a leader that could give uniform orders so we wouldn't fall apart.

Shun nodded at my suggestion and Itachi stared at me like I owed him one. "Fine, we will start by finding other teams, however, we only attack teams that are alone, and if I say we leave, we leave." Itachi said seriously, both Shun and I nodded. Quickly we got into the formation, with Shun in the middle, me at the front and Itachi at the back and we started adventuring into the sand maze.

It wasn't long before we met our first genin team. The team seemed to be from the Sunagakure itself, and the moment we sensed them, they seemed to sense us. They probably have a sensor on the team as well.

There was a moment of silence before the battle ensued. The Suna team had one support or medic by the look of it, as she stayed back when her teammates charged. Shun stayed in his position while he established the mental link with Itachi and I. Immediately we activated the sharingan.

The battle was quick, Itachi used his genjutsu to halt the opponents as I caught one in close combat. I could shameless say that I made quick work of him, after ten minutes, he was left paralyzed with a dislocated shoulder. Then I went to deal with the support sensor as Itachi was finishing up the other combat type shinobi. Surprisingly, she seemed to be very good at manipulating sand, probably due to her sensory through sand. Still I smiled and moved my body out of the way as Itachi sent a wave of water toward the girl. Her water soaked sand seemed to be dull and slow, and I quickly snatched her and locked her in a triangle choke hold. I didn't even need to remind him, as Shun quickly understood my action and he made the special seal of Yamanaka clan.

"Mind Body Switch Technique!" I let go of the hold as soon as Itachi caught Shun's limping body. The girl that was previously choking stood up and nodded to me. Without a word, 'she' reached into her pocket and fished out a piece of paper. 'She' threw the piece of paper to me before Shun's body was moving again. Quickly I grabbed the paper and hit the girl on the neck, effectively knocking her out.

"Let's go, it should be the one we don't have." I said to my team and we left quickly. When we arrived at a place rather far from the battlefield, I gave the piece of paper to Itachi to compare with the other one we got.

"It's different than the one we had, and it seemed to match up to it on one side. Now we just need to find the last one." Itachi said. Easier said than done, luck was really an issue here, only a one in three chance of getting it, under the condition we are able to beat the other team.

We wandered the area for another five hours, in the time period, we met another two team, one from Kumo and one from Grass. To say they were hostile was an understatement, they were like rabid dogs that attack anything on sight.

One thing I noticed was the arrogance from the Kumo genins, there were very confident of their skills, and they weren't joking. I twisted my body in a fraction of time to dodge the incoming flash of lightning. I was familiar with this jutsu, after all, I was almost killed by it during my kidnapping. Quickly I felt a wave a shuriken flying past me, chasing the three Kumo shinobi who had just dispersed. There were thin ninja wires tied to the end of it and I quickly formed the hand seals for Katon: Phoenix Sage Fire, blowing the fireballs onto the ninja wires. The fireballs followed the path that the shurikens made, one of the Kumo genin deflected the shurikens coming for him but failed to dodged the second wave of fireballs. He fell down from the sand dune with a scream; that's at least a second degree burn, if not a third degree.

I moved forward as the Kumo nin was distracted by their fallen comrade. I pulled out the tantō on my back and channelled lightning chakra over it. I had no idea what material Hyakki Yakō was made of, but it sure worked wonder for lightning chakra channeling. I quickly body flickered behind one of the kumo-nin - the girl who used the lightning jutsu earlier - and aimed for her right shoulder. She responded just in time to dodge my attack by side stepping to her left, turning around in the process. Quickly, I sweeped my leg toward her knee just before she could regain the balance. As she fell, my left hand locked around her neck and I pulled, bringing her body toward mine. She tried to get away, but before she could do anything, I jammed my lightning infused sword into her right shoulder blade, she gave out a yell before the paralysis jutsu took effect. I tied ninja wires around her limbs and body carefully before I drop her on the ground. With shinobi, you could never be too careful.

When I look back, Itachi was already done with the other guy before Shun took hold of him using Mind-body Switch technique. The guy under Shun's control walked towards the fallen shinobi suffering from the second-degree burn and pulled out the piece of paper. Itachi took the paper and restrained the two shinobi before Shun let go of the hold.

"This is not the one we were looking for, it's the same as the ones we got from the Suna-nin and the Grass-nin." Itachi said without emotion as I cursed silently. After all the hard work and a torn shirt from a lightning jutsu, we still keep getting the same piece of paper. We left the Kumo-nin alone and moved away. We were not so nice that we'd return the paper if they weren't what we need, the less competition the more chance of us advancing. Besides, having backups helped. Right now, Itachi had the paper #1 and a copy of paper #2 while both Shun and I had a copy of paper #2.

"We should rest and recover our chakra before continuing the search. We need to be more careful, the opponents are tough and they are years older than us. Their strength and stamina puts us at a disadvantage." Itachi said, and we all nodded. Shun kept the look out as Itachi and I recovered our chakra. After a while he would switch with one of us. Between the sharingan and sensory techniques, we kept each other alert in threat.

I had no idea if it was good luck or misfortune, but we were found by another team just as Itachi and Shun finished recovering. I caught a flash at the corner of my eyes. With the help of the sharingan I was able to follow the figure and shot out a Great Fireball toward it. I clearly saw the fireball and the human-like figure impact, yet I heard no scream nor release of Chakra for defense. Then I saw the most annoying thing I had ever encountered in my last nine years of life (The eighteen years before that was uncharted territory as everything was bad) - Puppets.

I found my close combat taijutsu style ineffective on puppets. Even though I kept on breaking their joints, they had no pain response and thus it did not hinder their movements. As long as their controllers attach them with chakra threads, they could ignore their dislocated joints and attack me with other parts. I cursed annoyingly as I hacked one of those puppets into pieces using lightning chakra infused blade and moved to dodge another one coming straight past my side. We had the luck of meeting a team clearly pulled out of puppets corps, and that's how we got locked into this annoying predicament.

' _Aim for the controller and the chakra strings'_ Itachi's voice rang in my head through Shun's mind communication jutsu. ' _Give me a distraction, Itachi, Shun, I want to try something'_ I asked them in my head and I got two positive responses.

Itachi moved before me as he pulled out a handful of shuriken using one hand and infused a breath of fire chakra onto the shuriken. Without any hesitation, he sent the flaming shurikens - known as Katon: Phoenix Sage Fire-Crimson Claw, an advanced form of Phoenix Sage Fire - towards the three puppet users. The puppet users moved their puppets hurriedly to block the incoming attack from Itachi; after his previous engagement with them, they learned to be wary of him.

Shun, catching the moment when one of the puppet user was concentrating on moving his puppets, formed the Yamanaka Seal and focused onto the unmoving puppeteer. "Mind Body Disturbance Technique" He whispered and let his chakra envelop the target. He couldn't control the target's body for long, as two seconds seemed to be his limit on normal targets. But that's enough for him to cause a distraction, as he took control over the puppet user's body and threw the puppets into the neighbouring puppets in a not so smooth motion.

As my teammates did their things, I performed the hand seal for Raiton: Rairyu no Mai in the background. After a string of hand seals, at the exact moment as Itachi's and Shun's distractions launched, I shot out three lightning Dragons from my palmed and willed them to accelerate toward the puppeteers. One of the lightning dragon hit a puppeteer dead on in a straight course, while the other two jumped to the side awkwardly. However, they probably thought it was another common lightning jutsu that acted like javelins. Using my sharingan, I saw their landing position as clear as day, and in a flash I changed the direction of the remaining two lightning dragon and hit both my targets, rendering both of them motionless on the ground.

"Gosh, Maiko, did you kill them?" Shun asked with shock as the smoke cleared, revealing three bodies lying on the sandy ground.

"No, they are probably just paralyzed. I've been practicing, and besides, my control was much better with just three lightning dragons. But we should still check for their heartbeats." I said uncertainly, receiving a glare from Shun.

We approached the fallen Suna-nins carefully, with kunais or swords in our hands, we checked to make sure they are knocked out and preferably not dead, that would really cause problems for us seeing we were currently in Sunagakure.

"They are still breathing, paralyze by the lightning and suffered some second-degree burn." Itachi said after checking the Suna-nins. I let out a breath and relaxed, it seemed that my control was lucky this time.

"Found it, our third piece!" Shun said excitedly as he pulled out a piece of paper from one of the puppet users' bags, "So what are we supposed to do with it?" He asked as he threw the paper to Itachi, who took out the other two piece from his pockets.

"I think it's just a space-time seal that allows transportation from one place to the next. Fuinjutsu is a complicated and uncommon art, the examiner wouldn't expect genins to know them very well. I believe it will transport us out as long as we fuse chakra into it." Itachi explained as we gather around him.

"Remember the examiner said that we need three, one for each of us, I think all of us need to grab a part of the paper and infuse our chakra in it in order for the seal to bring all of us back." I said. Itachi looked thoughtful for a second and nodded as well.

Quickly, we pieced the paper together into a square piece, now that the pieces were complete, I saw the artistically drawn picture forming an intricate circle. Silently, we all send our chakra into the paper at the same time, and the seal glowed bright before engulfing all three of us in the blinding light.

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Please leave a review if you feel like it! Thanks for reading!


	7. Chapter 7 - Only One of Us

A/N: just a small note, some readers have asked me if Maiko activated her Mangekyou sharingans yet from witnessing her teammate gets killed, and I might have left it a bit vague, but the answer is no, unfortunately. I have read somewhere that apparently after a person had witness the death of someone close, they will experience irritation in the eyes until they either decide that they care about that person deeply and are saddened by their death, in which the Mangekyou awakens, or they decide that they don't care, in which case the irritation fades and no mangekyou is awaken. Maiko's case is the latter, it's not that she doesn't feel anything from Daichi's death, but rather, a) she wasn't close enough to him yet, and b) she decided herself that she need to move past his death, to not care about him anymore, so that she would stay sane. It is in a way, her own coping strategy in which she developed, thinking it's the only way to survive. The activation of sharingan and mangekyou are of different degree, normal sharingan can be activated from traumas, but Mangekyou had to be activated from greater ones and the person has to care deeply about the one that died. Maiko is simply not there yet, that's why I wrote nothing happened to her eyes when the irritation faded.

Anyway, after the tedious explanation here is chapter seven! Chunin Exam Part II. I think I am going to update every week on Saturday, however, please forgive me if the update slows down in January and May since those are my exam times and I'm graduating this year.

Beta'd by the Fantabulous Alice J. ^_^

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Chapter 7 - Only One of Us

When the bright light disappeared, we found ourselves standing in an unfamiliar hall. Immediately, the cautious side of me went for my tantō until I saw the exam proctors in the room.

"Your team has successfully passed the second stage of the Chunin Exam. The third stage, the Tournament, will be starting right after the end of this stage. The line-up will be announced at the starting of the tournament." The proctor said emotionlessly before they escorted us out of the hall quickly.

"Well, that's that, at least we got out safely instead of being transported to somewhere in the desert." Shun said as we walked back to the hotel, and I couldn't agree more. At that moment, nobody knew what the hell was going on, maybe except for Itachi.

On our way to the hotel, we met Akira-sensei and Hatake Kakashi. Akira-sensei looked at as for a second before cracking a laughter, "What happened to you?" He asked while trying to contain his laughter. It's true we were not exactly on our best appearance right now, my shirt had multiple tears from the battle and thank Kami I had bandage wrapping on my chest beneath the shirt to save my dignity. Shun's orange-blonde pony tail had one side charred and he was missing one sleeve. Itachi, probably the most dignified out of all of us had a huge slash on his high collar T-shirt, as while as a burn mark on his pants.

We looked at each other and said at the same time, "Puppets" "Lightning release" "People". Then we stared at each other again before all breaking into random laughter, even Itachi gave us a smile.

"Either way, I need a shower. So don't you dare fight me for the first place on using the shower." I said as I glared Shun, knowing he will be the one always bickering with me.

"Hey, my hair was on fire, I think I deserve the first place." Shun fought back, not backing down for the sake of his hair.

"Your hair will be fine, besides, what's gone is gone. One the other hand, do you know how oily those puppet joints are? Be a man and let the girl take a shower first" I retorted, seeing the unbelievable face Shun was making.

"A girl? What kind of girl breaks people's bones and joints like dolls?" Shun yelled.

"So you do understand that I could break your bones like a doll." I said while seeing his face paled a bit, we had some painful sparring sessions before, though I never actually broke his bones before as I controlled my power so that it only inflicted temporary pain.

We bickered all the way back to the hotel, leaving our sensei behind sighing at our childishness. Eventually, I won the argument, but Itachi took the shower while we were arguing. Although I yelled at him, I couldn't help but feel happy about Itachi's occasional playfulness.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

Akira watched as his three most prized students bickered all the way back to the hotel feeling both pleased and relieved.

"What do you think?" He asked the Anbu Captain beside him, his students didn't need to know that the Jōnin instructors could watch the exams-in-process but they weren't allowed to interfere.

"They certainty have the talents. The Chunin exam should be no problem to them. Their teamwork seemed good, it's just… " The famous Kakashi of the sharingan said calmly.

"So you noticed, the gap between Shun and Itachi. Their reaction time to each other was significantly slower than with Maiko. You could say that she is the link for this genin team." Akira explained, it's a problem he kept on noticing for some while now. Because of how fast they react compare to the normal genins, his students never once noticed the gap between them.

"Was it because…" Kakashi asked, even without him finishing the sentence, Akira knew what he was going to ask. After all, as a former Anbu, he knew his identity as the Hound.

"Yes, it's because of Daichi. I was hoping that the barrier Shun had against Itachi would vanish with time, but I couldn't delay the Chunin exam any longer, they deserve it, and Daichi's death was not any of them's fault. The only reason this team is holding together is Maiko's link with both of them." Akira explained, he regretted not having enough time, but the pain of losing a teammate and the courage needed accept a new one was not something to be rushed.

"I'm sor… " Kakashi started but Akira stopped him.

"It's not anyone's fault. However, Maiko and Shun are only children, they may not understand it. Especially Maiko, she is the most perceptive children I've ever seen at her age, and I'm sure she already realized that my introduction about you is a lie. Be careful about your identity around her, she may seem like the calmest and most ruthless when it comes to battle, but that doesn't mean she had no emotions." Akira said thoughtfully and Kakashi nodded.

"I can understand Hokage-sama's decision, but you need to do your job and at least put on an appearance as an assistant teacher, or else, even I couldn't keep up the lies." Akira warned his kouhai; as much a genius Kakashi was, he was not a teacher material, at least, not right now.

"I'll keep that in mind, Akira-senpai. Those children have the strength to succeed this exam, but I'm afraid that their blooming strength would left them as vulnerable targets. Shun-kun should be fine if he choose to go to intelligence division, and I would propose to Hokage-sama to place the Uchiha children into special apprenticeship before they are strong enough instead of normal chunin teams." Kakashi proposed. Akira nodded at his careful plan, it's true that they would be able to grow faster with an apprentice, and the fatality rate would be lower.

"You are right, but it's very likely that it won't be their choice. Shun is a branch of Yamanaka, so he'll probably have a choice for his future. But seeing his ability in sensory and Mind techniques, he'd probably be recommended for intelligence division. But the other two, they are direct descendants of Uchiha. Just like Maiko once told me, their future is drawn out for them." Akira said sadly, pausing for a second to let this sink in.

"Their clan will probably make them as prominent as possible. Although Maiko would make a great candidate for Anbu, it will only be if she ever lets go of the prejudice. You haven't seen her fighting one on one in taijutsu, but you will see. She once admitted to me reluctantly that her taijutsu was made for killing and assassination, that unless she was able to use it without restriction, they will never reach their true power. Pretty grim for a nine-year-old, but I've seen it in action." Akira admitted before he started to walk toward the hotel they were staying.

Kakashi trailed behind, Akira-senpai did not know that he already seem those moves for assassination in action before. Once again, his mind moved to the image of the cold and ruthless eyes of that seven-year-old girl, eliminating the enemy at the first sight of opportunity without any hesitation and emotional turmoil. As rarely as it happened, it was like she was built for Anbu.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

Since we finished the second stage quite early, by the time we were all cleaned up, it was only half-past eight in the evening, which meant, we had some time before tomorrow morning's tournament.

I was silently drying my hair with a towel as the boys rest on the bed. We were all pretty tired from the earlier ordeal, but seeing the lights outside on the Suna streets, I couldn't help but stare at the lively night market outside. Due to my training in my previous life at OLYMPUS, I was never given the freedom to go where I wanted to. Father wouldn't allow to us to miss training for something he deemed so trivial.

My face must have expressed some longing, because Itachi immediately noticed and asked me: "Do you want to go to night market, Mai?" I stared at him for a second, not sure what to respond. "No, we should rest, it's late. You must be tired." I said. The streets in a foreign village were not safe, we could be killed in a back alley for all I knew.

Before I could get away from the window, Itachi body flickered in front of me and poked me in the forehead, he said: "You should really act like a little sister sometimes so I don't feel like an inadequate big brother."

"Let's go, come on, act like a child once, a cute one, not the annoying one who likes to bicker with me." Shun added with a casual smile.

"Your funeral then. But really, thank you." I cracked a smile at my teammates, appreciating their caring nature.

As we walked on the main street of Suna, looking at the fancy lights, hearing the laughters of children and smelling the delicious aroma from food stalls, I couldn't help but wonder if this was a normal scene for normal children. Even though their country was constantly fighting and arguing with others, they still laughed and played like nothing was happening. Were they oblivious, or were they just numb from all of it? Probably the first option, they seemed way too innocent for the second option. I was speaking from experience, I was numbed by the numerous kills of my targets, and the numerous deaths of fellow operatives. They were not important, we were not important, so I let them be forgotten. At least, that's until my death, then everything came back, including the memory of him… ironic, considering I didn't even know his real name… _Geez, can I not think about it, it's such a nice day._

I walked past a small weapon shop, the things they sold there weren't that useful in normal shinobi fights, but they looked quite interesting. There were some kids gathering in the shop, so this weapon shop must have been catering to children.

"Excuse me, Mister, may I see that please?" I said sweetly to the shop owner, and he smiled back, taking the merchandise I wanted off of the wall. I was surprised when I saw that thing, but it looked awfully like a crossbow from my previous life. To my knowledge, shinobi in this world rarely use things like bow or crossbow, since they have shuriken and kunai for that. However, in my belief, learning to shoot something was so much easier than to throw something, just take guns and shurikens for example.

"It's an interesting design, right? My son introduced it from the west, he said it was called a 'crossbow'; thanks to his ideas, our shop has become a lot more popular." The middle-aged man said to me. I smiled at him like a child would do, but I was quite surprised that the man called out the actual name of the product, not a Japanese translation, but said the English with a Japanese accent.

"Maiko, why would you buy something so strange? You can't use it in battle." Shun said quietly beside me as I examine the crossbow, even Itachi looked very curious at the strange new weapon I was holding.

"It's Sasuke's birthday today, I should give him a present from Sand when we return, to say sorry for missing his fourth birthday." I said nonchalantly as I tested the crossbow with a shop board about twenty meters away. The wooden spike in the crossbow struck exactly where I wanted it to be, on the star beside the shop name. The penetration still needs some work, but I could fix that up at home, I thought, it's an easy weapon for Sasuke to use and it wouldn't require a lot of practice like shuriken throwing. For now, it would be great for personal protection.

"You are buying your four-year-old brother a weapon for his birthday?" Shun asked with disbelief.

"Of course, it's Sasuke, he loves weapons." I said calmly as I pulled out my wallet and paid the price. It's not that expensive since it's a shop mostly for children. The shop owner wrapped the crossbow for me in a bag and handed it to me.

"Come on, stop staring, let's go eat some mochi and dango. I heard there are different flavors than what we have in Konoha, you sure you don't want to try?" I tempted Itachi. If there was one weakness he had, it's his sweet tooth. Like I expected, he looked away with a red hue on his face.

"Once in a lifetime opportunity, where we can eat at a Suna sweet shop without being branded as enemy shinobi." I said as I grabbed Itachi with my right hand, and Shun with my left and dragged both of them with me toward the sweet shop.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

Next day at 7:00 am, all the surviving genin teams lined up in the big arena made of sandstones and limestones. After two stages, there were only six teams including us left. There were two Sunagakure teams, one Iwagakure team, one Kumogakure teams, Konohagakure team, and one Amegakure team. Surprisingly, there was no Kirigakure team, as a result of that, only the Kages from Suna, Konoha, Iwa and Kumo will be attending the final round.

We stood in the Arena, surrounded by cheering audience, judged by examiners and the Kages, like gladiators from Roman Empire, I didn't even know if this was an honour or humiliation.

"The third stage of Chunin exam, the tournament will start now. The line up will be announced immediately. Match one: Uchiha Maiko from Konoha vs. Fushimi Keigo from Suna. Match two: Daikoku Kojiro from Kumo vs. Fuwa Meiha from Ame. [...] Match six: Yamanaka Shun from Konoha vs. Ishikawa Daisuke from Iwa. [...] Match nine: Uchiha Itachi from Konoha vs. Fuwa Mizuko from Ame. The order will be reshuffled each round. Do your best and show us the full extent of your abilities." The Suna-nin said with a loud voice, just like a gladiator show, the crowd cheered excitedly.

As the crowd died down and the arena cleared, the first match started. I walked into the center of the arena and my opponent did the same. He was a Suna ninja with a medium build, his face covered in a standard hijab the Suna-nin usually wore. There were really nothing out of ordinary with him, but as soon as the match started, I cursed my luck. He used PUPPETS.

Immediately, I charged lightning chakra into my tantō, and let the bright light crackle with a familiar humming sound. The joints of the puppets were suppose to be their weak points, but they don't feel pain, so unless I could destroy all the joints at once, they don't stumble and fall because of a dislocated kneecap. So instead of my usual lock and twist technique, I went with straight brutality with my sword, the kenjutsu Akira-sensei taught me was not a soft wind, it was a piercing hurricane. I body flickered to behind one of the four puppets he had out, and pierced the lightning blade into the joint between it's body and head. I willed the lightning chakra to burst and jumped away from the puppet the moment it's hand swung up to attack. After my landing a few meters away from the puppets, the wooden puppets was charred and busted apart by the lightning current I sent through. One down, three to go.

Of course, things were never that simple. The puppeteer moved his finger and the three puppets opened it's mouth and spit out senbons. I had no idea where they came from, but my priority right now was to dodge the damn pointed objects. I ran around the arena to get away from the senbons, in the meantime, I made the hand seals for Katon: Great Fireball Technique and let the giant fireball shot out of my mouth. I aimed the Fireballs at the puppeteer, and as expected, he moved to dodge and sent one of his puppets to block the attack. That puppet spun around at high speed in an attempt to create whirlwind to decrease the damage of the flame.

Quickly, I bend down and made the hand seal for Raiton: Rairyu no Mai. This time, I extended my palm and only shot out two lightning dragon and put full power into it. I aimed the lightning dragons at the puppets as there is a time lag between the control of the puppeteer and the actual movement, thus the maneuver speed was no match for the full power lightning. Quickly, in a flash, the two puppets were struck by the lightning dragons, and they burst into charred mess at the huge amount of chakra I used. Without missing a beat, using the time for the puppeteer's surprise, I rushed toward him. A puppeteer was no puppeteer without the hands, I couldn't be sure that I won't kill him with the lightning release, but I could make sure that his hands won't move anymore.

I appeared behind his back and grabbed his arms with my two hands. Then I jumped and flipped over his head, bringing his unprepared arm with me. I could hear the scream when I landed on the ground and the unnatural twist of his arms, and without hesitation, I turned around and placed my sword at his neck. There was a drop of blood coming out of the thin line where it touched his neck.

"Surrender, your shoulders are dislocated, and I don't suggest moving them before it's healed. You move one finger and I will slice your head off." I said coldly, watching his expression filled with pain and fear.

"I surrender." He yelled, and I dropped the blade, but still keeping my eyes on him until the examiner came and pronounced me the winner. The Sand genin gave me a look full of hatred before he was carried off by the medics. I quickly walked off of the field, I may have overkilled a bit, but the puppets, I really hate them. I sat silently down on the audience section along with my teammate. They nodded to me and I smiled back; my show was over, it's their turn.

After a few match, it was Shun's turn. He walked into arena calmly, facing his opponent from Iwa. Beside me, a voice asked, "Do you think he could win, to me he seemed like a support for the team." I immediately realize that the voice is from the supposed teaching assistant. Without turning my eyes away from the arena, I answered "Really, he must be getting good at acting. Shun, well, he's not flashy as us, and I doubt people will pay attention to others when they saw two sharingan users on one team." I paused, looking at the arena, the Iwa-nin was getting angry at the projectiles that Shun kept throwing at him. The Iwa-nin was a rather well-built boy, and Shun was trying to avoid getting close up to him.

"Shun is the smart one, he just doesn't like to show it around," I said as I narrowed my eyes at Shun, who is trying to dodge from the wave of rock from the earth release. "What he doesn't show is that his long range projectiles are almost as good at Itachi, he spent a lot of time on it. It isn't fancy like in the way the Uchihas like to do it, but rather it's the calculation of projectile paths. Just use your sharingan, Hatake-san, and you will see." Shun was still sending waves of shuriken and kunai out at the aggressive Iwa-nin. Occasionally, he will use some water release or wind release to halt the attacks. But from the outsider's point of view, Shun was barely hanging on.

Beside me, Kakashi of sharingan quietly raised his hand to uncover the hitai-ate hiding his left eye. I saw the large scar that ran across his eyes, and when he opened his left eye, I saw the familiar red iris with black tomoes. He stared for a second before widening his eyes in realization.

"So now you see, and it's right on time." I said quietly as the battle ensued. The Iwa-nin was about to finish the attack with another earth release, to him, it seemed like that Shun was no threat but a fly hanging on. But before he could finish the seal, Shun shot out a kunai that seemed to be in the complete opposite direction from his opponent.

It all happened in a blink, while the Iwa-nin was still doing the hand seal, there seemed to be something invisible around him that started to restrain him. His hands were bound by something and he couldn't finish his sign. If one were to look closely, they would see the thin, almost transparent wires wrapping around the Iwa-nin's arm, neck, leg, and fingers.

Of course, those thin wires wouldn't be able to completely restrain the bulky Iwa-nin, however, a second of his immobility is enough. Shun had already finished his hand seal for Mind-Body Disturbance technique. His conscious wrapped around the Iwa-nin precisely, and with a harsh strike, Shun willed the Iwa-nin to picked up his own Kunai and stabbed himself in the chest, barely missing the heart. When Shun's control over his body was over in three seconds, the examiner immediately stopped the match, clearly seeing that Shun could have killed the Iwa-nin with a potential stab to the neck.

"Geez, just how many people you've fooled with that innocent smile of yours?" I teased as Shun walked back triumphantly, and all he did was stuck out his tongue and smiled at me.

"Isn't this the pot calling the kettle black? Either way, I got lucky." Shun said behind me as we continue to watch the match. A few matches later, it's Itachi's turn. No one was really worried about him, that Ame genin really tried to put up a fight, but the moment she let Itachi wrap a genjutsu around her, she was doomed. Itachi finished quickly, using the projectiles and fire release to distract her, and then putting a genjutsu on her. I believe she fainted after the genjutsu. He didn't show his true strength at all, even I wasn't sure how strong he was now.

The round two started right after the first one. There should be nine winners, but in one of the matches between a Suna-nin and Kumo-nin, they almost killed each other, resulting in the Kumo-nin's victory, but he also collapsed from injury right after, causing him to be unable to proceed the matches. The tournament was also a place of showing each village's strength as the Kages were watching. The entirety of the tournament has to be completed on the one day where the Kages were visiting, and since Suna was in charge, it wouldn't be unreasonable for them to scratch off a foreign competitor under the excuse that his injury was too grave. Of course, he did look almost dead, so even if he were to continue, he could be killed in one shot. The way Suna announced him as unable to continue due to injury helped save their faces, since their Suna genin was beaten by this kumo-nin in the first round. So now, there were eight genin left, three from Konoha, one from Kumo, three from Suna and one from Iwa, and we were paired off as four matches:

Kazeyama Sunari (Suna) vs. Kihara Fubuki (Suna)

Uchiha Itachi (Konoha) vs Tsukichi Kenji (Iwa)

Uchiha Maiko (Konoha) vs Omoi (Kumo)

Yamanaka Shun (Konoha) vs. Akihito Katsu (Suna)

I watched in silence while the first match continued. Those Suna genins were good, not in a magical way, but still could be called talented. They only seemed 12 or 13 years old, which were younger than the average age of 14 for chunin exams. One of the Kunoichi, Sunari, was significantly stronger than the other, Fubuki. Unlike Fubuki, who was most likely specialized in ninjutsu/genjutsu by the look of her previous matches, Sunari was an all-rounder. Her hand to hand combat was quite good, especially in a mix of Taijutsu and occasionally some ninjutsu. Against, Fubuki, whose only strength seemed to be her long range wind release and area of effect earth release, the moment Sunari got closed to her, the battle was done. I had a feeling that Sunari would be advancing to the final, although with whom, I had no idea.

The next match, centered around Itachi being awfully calm all the time. The Iwa-nin he faced was not the usual bulky kind you'd imagined, but a lean guy. Still, he could pack a punch, judging from the crater of the impact, I did not want to be hit by those. However, Itachi, like Sunari, was an all-rounder. He may present himself as a ninjutsu/genjutsu long range fighter, but his taijutsu was not to be trifled with. The Iwa-nin was misinformed and got beaten quite quickly.

Soon, I was standing in the arena facing off with Kumo genin who looked as small as me. He had dark tan skin and bleached blonde hair. He had a katana behind his back. I eyed him coldly. I thought I was the youngest at this chunin exam, but apparently, this boy, Omoi seemed to be as young as me, maybe even younger.

"Hey, you specialize in Kenjutsu right? Let's have a fight in kenjutsu." He said coolly. I tipped my head to the side, contemplating his words. It's true my best weaponry was kenjutsu, but my fighting skill did not consist of just that, nor would I say it was my specialty. My specialty was… _Assassination_.

"No, my kenjutsu is not that good that I'm confident that I can win with it alone." I answered.

"That's a shame, but I will beat you with my sword." Without wasting any time, he pulled out his long katana and charged at me.

Within the blink of an eye, he was in front of me, his katana crashing straight toward my face. I immediately brought my tantō up and blocked his strike. He was obviously stronger than me, as his katana pushed my tantō back towards my face. I couldn't give him the advantage of attacking whenever he wanted since his katana had a longer reach than me, so physically I was at a disadvantage.

Quickly I jumped back and twisted my body in mid-air to avoid another strike at my ribs. I landed a few meters away and started moving quickly. Omoi was following me, he caught up with me and engaged me in another set of kenjutsu battle. He hacked at me with amazing speed, his kenjutsu allowing him to reach a full circle behind him to block my surprise attacks using body flicker. I dodged once again at his full circle swing, lowered my body and aimed for his leg. I just need to slash one nerve, and then his muscle would have fallen apart.

However, he was an intuitive kenjutsu user, he seemed to sense my intention and now we were locked in a stalemate. I was fast enough to dodge his powerful strikes and he was intuitive enough to see through my fast strikes. I jumped up again as he struck towards my neck. Softly, I landed on his katana just for a second and jumped out again, pushing his katana down in the process. I twirled my tantō in my hand down and it grazed him on the shoulder as he dodged it. I flipped away and landed behind him. I struck again, aiming for his neck before he could turn around, but he realized that and quickly he brought his katana up and blocked the strike.

We held our swords in that position for a while, he was pressing forward hard, and I was trying my best to keep his blade from hacking into me. It's now or never, I thought, then I stared into Omoi's eyes with my red eyes, but immediately, he closed his eyes shut. For that second, I spun my tantō around, let his sword slide down on me, moving my body so it wouldn't slice me open. I saw his eyes widen in shock as my sword lost all strength against him and his sword whizzed passed me. I ignored the cut on my arm as his sword fell down, and went for his shoulder. I grabbed his shoulder and elbow, gathering chakra on my left hand on his shoulder and I twisted it down with full force.

At the same as I heard the familiar sound of a shoulder dislocating, I felt a crushing force in my stomach. He punched my stomach just as I dislocated his shoulder. I flew backward, but I balanced my body quickly and rolled my body to minimize the fall. As soon as I got up, I saw Omoi's right arm hanging uselessly and his katana now in his left arm. Alright, Kenjutsu was not working, so let's try other stuff. Quickly I formed the hand seal for fire release, and let a great fireball shot out of my mouth. He started to dodge, but I wasn't finished, up next, phoenix sage fire shot out of my mouth, and he dodged some while canceling some with lightning jutsu. Once again, I did a fire release, I pressed my hands on the ground, and lines of fire ran from my palm toward my target, it looked just like fire serpent trying to catch it's target. He jumped up in haste while trying to dodge both the fire line on the ground as well as the flying sage fire in the air. He used the lightning release to cancel one of the fireballs flying, but as soon as the fire and lightning dissipated, he was staring into my sharingan with the tomoes furiously spinning.

He went into a stupor for a moment as I cast a fast working genjutsu on him, then I sprinted, moving past my own ninjutsu and body flickered behind him, slightly above his head. Then I started a string of familiar motion, as I landed on the ground I locked my arm on his shoulder, brought my knee up and hit his spine. His body was stronger than I thought, and thus, the hit didn't really damage his back, but it just gave a painful feeling and the involuntary curving of his back. Then I bent backward into a bridge, flipping his body over my head and let it crash into the ground head first as I did a backflip as well while still clenching my arms on his neck, choking harder than ever. The moment I landed on his back, I pulled up his neck in an unnatural position. _Kill him, don't kill him, kill him, don't kill him_. It's simple, his body might be strong, but his neck was still weak and mushy, one twist, he's a goner. But he didn't threaten my survival, therefore no need to kill him.

The debate ended in a flash and I quickly gathered some lightning chakra and pressed my hand on his neck. I clenched the back of his neck hard as I send electrical currents into his body. Strong enough that he would be paralyzed but not enough to kill him. Usually, this amount of current would kill someone instantly if not paralyze them forever. However, this is a ninja world, and our bodies were stronger than normal, especially Omoi's. I kept the current coming until I could no longer feel any resistance. The only sign telling me that he's alive is the occasional spasm of his muscles. Quickly, the proctor announced the winner, not wanting anyone to die in their exam. Omoi was carried off of the arena by the medic, and I left it with large bruising on my stomach.

"Tell me, are you happy with your kenjutsu?" As soon as I walked to where my teammates were sitting, Akira-sensei asked me in an icy tone.

"No." I said honestly, lowering my head a bit in shame. I knew that Akira-sensei spent a lot of time training me in kenjutsu, yet I almost never had the chance to perfect it, as I had another way of fighting that I was more comfortable with. If I just had a straight kenjutsu battle with Omoi, I would no doubt lose.

"That's right, I've been too relaxed with your kenjutsu, and you've grown arrogant with your arsenals. It was your choice to take up kenjutsu from me, so I expect you to master it regardless of what else you can do." Akira-sensei pointed out harshly and I nodded my head. My kenjutsu was definitely lacking, so after the Chunin exam, I would need to spent time master it. But had I grown too arrogant? I had no idea, maybe I had. The logical answer would be that I had. With my previous life, I thought of myself as an adult in a child's body. Was it confidence or arrogance, I was confused. I had grown comfortable with the feeling of being a prodigy, even though half of it was like cheating with answers you gain from your previous lifetime. I debated on other's lives as if they were that simple. Ah, I had definitely grown arrogant, and arrogance leads to downfall. But before I was more time to think about it, Shun's match began.

It was a hard match for him; the Suna-nin, Akihito Katsu was strong just like Sunari. Shun was trying his best, but his opponent's type was just too much of a hassle for him. Katsu specialized in long range wind attacks with his twin tessen, and now that Shun's first trick using projectiles and ninja wires had been exposed, Katsu was very careful to sever all the ninja wires and blow all the projectiles away. Shun might have met his match, but he sure left with a bang. I suddenly understood why he had packs of explosive tags. That explosion was both pretty and heart wrenching. Although Katsu won, he left the arena with half of his cloth burned and black smoke covered his body, and Shun just gave us an apologetic smile before surrendering, claiming his chakra was depleted and all his weapon used. I had no way of telling if that's true or not, but I trust Shun must have had a reason.

When the line-up for the third round came up, all of the member's of my team took a breath and smiled bitterly. It said clearly on the wall, with bold letters and caption:

 **MATCH ONE: KAZEYAMA SUNARI VS. AKIHITO KATSU**

 **MATCH TWO: UCHIHA ITACHI VS. UCHIHA MAIKO**

Oh, this was going to be fun.


	8. Chapter 8 - No Exit

A/N: So here is Chapter 8, and we are going to wrap up the Chunin exam. Also, in case you have not noticed, I added a title for each chapter, in responding to a strong suggestion from my Beta. This chapter's title is in reference to a French Play "No Exit" by Jean-Paul Sartre. It's an interesting play I've read in school, and it has quite a theme.

Beta'd by my friend Alice J, who is also drowning in homework just like me, the program we are taking has no mercy...

* * *

Chapter 8 - No Exit

 _So comical_ , that's the thought that crossed my mind for a second when Itachi and I walked down to the arena. When was the last time I had an actual fight with him, not just in a training, but a real one where neither of us held back. _Never…_

However, the thought of fighting him made my heart ache with excitement, the chance to fight him, Itachi, the one I had never beaten before, the one I had looked up to. Such a guilty pleasure, finding joy in violence. But was this really the place to do so, in a Chunin exam, in a foreign village, in front of everyone.

Logically speaking, one of us should surrender, allowing the other to have full strength for the final. Logically, it's bad to blow up the arena, which I'm sure would happen if we keep it up long enough. Logically speaking, he would have a better chance at winning than me, he was stronger. I opened my mouth slightly to say the words, but when I saw Itachi's expression in deep thought, I closed my mouth, knowing that he was thinking about the exact same thing. Damn it, I really wanted to fight with him, battle with him, I was sure that mortal combat was a form of bonding. But…

"I surrender." I said quickly before Itachi could say anything. _Logic sucks_. The arena was silent for a moment as I walked away. The audience yelled in disappointments, but really, I couldn't care less.

I sat back down with my teammate and teachers, the proctor was announcing Itachi's victory and the start of the final round. However, before the match began, Itachi mumbled something quietly. It was so quiet that no one could hear him, but he knew that with my eyes, I could see the movement of his lips clearly, "You owe me a fight when we get back". I smiled as the final round of Uchiha Itachi from Konoha vs. Kazeyama Sunari from Suna began in the arena, _don't worry, I'll definitely repay you._

In the end, Itachi won against the Suna kunoichi, although their fight was long and drawn out, and no doubt the crowd loved their show. The Yondaime Kazekage didn't seem to enjoy the finale, no doubt having a Konoha nin winning the Suna Chunin exam hitting a dent in his heart, yet he couldn't do anything as the Sandaime Hokage was there as a guest.

Finally, we lined up at the arena in front of the Kages, listening to them announcing the winners. Almost everyone who got into the third stage received the Chunin status, and everyone who advanced to the second round of the tournament was promoted into Chunin, that included, me, Itachi, Shun, and Omoi, that Kumo-nin who was a kenjutsu expert. I smiled sincerely as I watched Itachi curled his lip a bit and Shun laughing as we received the certificate. I suddenly remembered mom's promise, I was looking forward to returning home.

The team left quickly just following Hokage-sama's departure. Hatake Kakashi disappeared the moment we returned to Konoha territory, Akira-sensei did not try his hardest to explain his absence, I thought at this point, he already gave up trying to make us believe Hatake Kakashi's fake job as an assistant teacher. Prodigious jonin who disappeared a few years back after the war, incredible skill, require legal identities to enter a foreign village, acting under the order that Akira-sensei couldn't refuse. He was from that division, working straight under the Hokage, he was from Anbu.

"I guess this is it, we are all chunin now. Anyone had any idea what their career will be from now on." Shun asked when we returned to Konoha. I frowned slightly at the prospect of my future, I once thought that I would have no future, until Daichi told me that he would find it with me, with our team… _well, that's not happening now, is it._

"Still working on it, what about you, All-Figured-Out-san?" I asked Shun.

"Funny you should say that, because I do have it figured out. Don't worry, Daichi made us promise to find dreams together, even if he's… not here, I will also find your dreams with you." Shun said with a mix of sorrow and comfort.

We split our ways when we went back to our residence. It was only five in the afternoon, so I had no idea why the compound was lit up. Itachi and I walked quietly towards the main house, noticing the gathering hall next to it being full of light. Was there an event in the compound that we didn't know?

When we arrived at the door, I heard Sasuke's loud voice yelling: "Quickly! Nee-chan! Nii-chan! Or you will be late!" I narrowed my eyes at that, _late? For what?_ "Quickly, Maiko, Itachi, you two need to get ready." Mom rushed out of the door dressed in a formal, light yellow kimono, a small Sasuke stood by her feet, also dressed in a formal dark blue men's kimono.

"Wait, what's happening here? What do we need to get ready for?" I asked with confusion, but mom already rushed me and Itachi inside.

"Why? it's for you and Itachi of course, your father is hosting a party to celebrate you two becoming chunin, especially Itachi, who won the tournament. You two are your father's pride, and mine as well!" Mom said as she pushed me down on a chair, while Itachi was being ushered away by another woman, one of our older cousins, I believed.

"Wait, before you take away all my weapons, I have something I need to give to Sasuke." I yelled as I watch mom confiscated all of my weapons that were deemed unfit to show at a party. She stopped for a second and let me pulled out the crossbow from my bag and handed it to a curious Sasuke.

"For your birthday, Sasuke, you just need to use am it like this and pull the trigger," I grabbed his small little hand and pointed it at one of the paper lanterns by the door, and pulled the trigger on the crossbow. Sasuke's eyes widened in amazement as the wooden arrow flew straight toward the lantern and popped it like balloons. "There you go, don't shoot at yourself or others, unless they are attacking you." I winked at him and he ran away toward the back yard. When I looked up again, I saw mom's disapproving face.

"Really, Maiko, a weapon of all things?" Mom asked me exasperatedly, but I just smiled at her and said: "Mom, it'll be fine, Sasuke should be old enough to start handling the weapons now. Besides, it's always good to have a weapon by his side that he could use in an emergency." Mom sighed at my words, but she did not reprimand me further.

For the next hour, I realized just how much I missed my kunoichi shorts, my short sleeved shirt, and my thin ninja vest. After mom forced me to do a quick bath, she put layered clothes on my tiny nine-year-old body. The kimono was quite beautiful, a dark purple decorated with white flowers. The flower itself was quite unusual since usually kimono was decorated with cherry blossoms or plum blossoms, but the flowers on my kimono were night-blooming cereus, the kind that blooms only at night, once in a lifetime. The white flowers on my kimono were blossoming, its' white petals seeming to glow slightly as if they were basking under the moonlight. The kimono perfectly captured the moment of the night-blooming cereus' only bloom in their lifetime, their most beautiful moment.

Mom mercilessly put the heavy garment on my layer after layer, when she finally put the outer layer on my and tied it with obi, I felt my chest hurting from all the tight clothes. Then she carefully twisted and pinned my hair up in an elegant semi-bun, leaving the end of the hair hanging on my right shoulder, curled slightly. She put a lustrous silvery hair ornament on my hair, the ornament in the shape of flying white crane, adorned with sparkling snowflakes. When she's done, I realized that I looked like a doll, a perfect doll ready for the showcase.

"Alright, let's go to the celebration. Just remember that you don't have to say anything to anyone unless you are being asked by an elder. Just two hours, I promise, and then you can leave." Mom put her hand on me and pushed me toward the gathering hall. I walked slowly and as elegantly as I could, remembering all the etiquette lessons mom taught me about being a lady.

I entered the lit up the hall, suddenly feeling all the eyes on my, those of admiration, those of curiosity, those of greed and those of criticism. They. Were. All. On. Me. It's an excruciating feeling, knowing you were being judged, for me, who walked the shadow, it was almost like a bird being exposed in harsh headlights, featherless. Nevertheless, I gave them a perfect little smile and joined the party. The two hours passed in a flurry of courteous words. The elders asked about my training, but I was sure they had access to my stats already, so I answered: "It's well, but I need to work harder." They asked me about my chunin exam, and I answered: "There were many challenging opponents, but I had to protect Uchiha's pride". They asked me what's my aspiration for future, remembering my father's words, I answered in one of those choreographed answers "I wish to add strength for the Uchiha clan, I wish to help my father and support my brother." It was a tedious task, really, but unlike enemies, I couldn't just hack them all away.

When it was nine o'clock, the party was over and all the guests went home. However, only later when father ordered us to return to the main house living room, did I realize that the worst was not over yet.

I sat in my expensive kimono along with Itachi, in front of the wooden table in the living room. Father was staring at me with rage and shock, and one could hear the heavy rain crashing down onto the house and the roaring thunder that seemed to yell out the bloodied battle cry. In the background. However, it could not have been more intense than the atmosphere inside the living room.

"What did you say to me?" Father said in a deep voice, clearly suppressing his rage and anger.

"I said, I will not join Anbu like you decided." I said calmly, articulating every word as clear as possible. Father slammed the table with such force that the table cracked. Mom let out a small cry behind us and I controlled my body so that I wouldn't flinch.

"You dare to disrespect me, your father, the head of your clan? That's not your decision to make, child, it's an honour to work in Anbu and bring knowledge to the clan." He yelled at me, and I closed my eye to block out the sound.

"No, father, I will contribute to the clan some other way, but I refuse to act as your spy from Anbu. It's no one's decision but mine to make, there's no way you could force me… " I said calmly, but before I could finish, father slapped me on the cheek and I fell to the side from the force. Mom cried out and ran to my side. I cupped my red cheek and felt the burning sensation from the slap. I raised my eyes again, seeing the flame burning in my father's eyes.

"No, you are wrong, I can force you because this is the decision of the clan. Do you have any idea how hard the clan has been for the past four years? This is your way of contributing to the clan, your only way. So do not think you can pass it off just because you are my daughter. Someone needs to go inside Anbu, and with your talent, you would be able to climb up the rank fast." Father explained, but it did not sound like an explanation, more of a forced argument.

"Then, I will take that job for her. I will go to Anbu." Before I could say anything, I heard the same stoic that protected and comforted me numerous times, sentencing himself into the black abyss instead of me.

"No! You can't! No!" I screamed, trying to drown out his words, making it an illusion. The only reason that I would be against going to Anbu so much lay in my previous life. _I can't, I just can't, going to another prison, another Tartarus_. The feeling of isolation, the helplessness as I kill on orders, the lack of emotion as I clean the bodies. My life was not my own, my body was not my own. Finally, in this life, I got a chance, a chance to kill for my own survival, not for someone else or something else. But, Itachi, now I pushed him to that prison. He couldn't, he's too kind, unlike me, who's been bathed in blood for 12 years even before I was born, he's too kind, so kind that even when he killed, he would kill them for mercy. Anbu will drown out that kindness until they turn to ruthlessness.

"You can't do that, Itachi, haven't you heard, your future lies in Konoha Police, it's your legacy as the heir, and you will learn everything about a leader with me. It's not your job to take her place." Father said in a stone cold voice, but it didn't seem to affect Itachi at all.

"She's right, father, you can't force her. What use would you have for someone who is unwilling, let alone the fact that Sandaime Hokage will never agree if she's unwilling and she could easily commit suicide if she really wants to. Let me take her place, you need someone on the inside, and I'm your best choice aside from Maiko. Anyone could take charge at the police station, but only I could go to Anbu." Itachi laid his case out carefully, for once, Father was stunned to speechless.

"Fine, do what you want Itachi. But remember, from this moment on, she is not my daughter anymore, she is not an Uchiha anymore. Sasuke, we will start your training tomorrow, you need to catch up now that you are the second heir of the Clan." father said without emotion as he walked away. He didn't even look at me.

 _I need to… I need to get him out of there, I need to stop Itachi, stop father… I just need to say I'm sorry and tell him I would go to Anbu… I just need to tell him I would go to Anbu… That's all I need to do…_ But. I couldn't. I was such a coward.

I did the only thing a coward could do at that moment, I ran away. I pushed out the front door and ran outside. I could hear mom screamed for me to come back, but I couldn't face her. Because of my selfishness, I pushed Itachi to the dark abyss against all he wanted, and I forced Sasuke to take on my responsibility. All I could do was run, run away from everything until I could forget.

It was still raining outside like a downpour, and it drenched my expensive kimono as I slipped through the dark streets. The rain brutally washed apart my hair in the bun, I thought ironically, what is this, some kind of pathetic fallacy? As I angrily pulled out the hair ornament weighing on my hair. I felt a string of warm water dripping down my face, I felt it so clearly against the cold water spattering against my face. Just where the hell I was running to, I had no idea, somewhere, I guessed.

I ran past all the commercial building, past all the lit up streets, until I reached a small apartment building where I'd only been to once in my memory. I ran up the stairs, 303, no it was 304. Almost panicking, I reached the third floor and walked up to suite 304. After a slight pause, I knocked on the door, waiting nervously on the porch.

The door opened, revealing a teenage boy with long orange hair pulled into a ponytail. He looked shocked, but nevertheless, Shun asked: "What happened to you, and what are you doing out here this late."

"I, I, don't have anywhere else to go." I said quietly, trying to hold back another wave of sourness, it just sounded so alone when I said it out loud. I accidentally peaked inside and to my surprise, I saw there was another man in his place, Kakashi of sharingan was sitting by the table, holding a tea cup.

"Ah, sorry, I didn't know you had a guest. I'll come back later." I said as I turned away in embarrassment. But before I could walk away, Shun grabbed my arm and dragged me in.

"Don't be ridiculous, I can't possibly let you wait outside in this weather. You don't mind, do you? Hatake-san, it'll just be a moment." Shun asked and Kakashi just nodded nonchalantly. He led me into the house and gave me a towel to wipe my head.

"You can start by telling me what's going on when I try to find dry clothes for you. Your super expensive kimono is all soaked in water, you'll get a cold from that." he teased as he rummaged through the drawers. I felt mildly self-conscious, my hair was like a crazy woman, and my kimono just looked plain weird in this environment, besides, there's not only Shun in this room but that freaking famous Anbu. I wondered if it's alright that I said the truth, but what the hell, it's not gonna change anything right now.

"I, I got kicked out of the clan." I summarized, holding the towel on my head.

"Oh, that… Wait, what?" Shun screamed across the room, even Kakashi seemed mildly surprised by it. "Please, expand on your explanation!" Shun yelled out again.

"After we returned, we had a boring party with the elders, but when it's over, Father wanted me to join Anbu and Itachi to lead the police department. I told him 'no', so he kicked me out. He said I'm no longer his daughter or a member of the Uchiha clan anymore, so I guess that means I'm exiled from the clan now." I said mockingly, one mistake, and then I lost nearly everything I built for, but I didn't regret saying no to father, my only regret was that I had pushed Itachi to take my fault.

"Hold on, he wanted you to join Anbu? Why?" Shun asked with a frown.

"How am I supposed to know, better the Clan, gaining status, whatever father could think of for the sake of Uchiha clan. I said that I would never join Anbu and I meant it." I said harshly, ignoring that there was someone from Anbu in the same room as me, I must be getting stupid and careless with all the emotions run wild.

"Why would you… Tell me, is it because of what happened to Daichi, if that's the case…" Shun asked as he pulled out some T-shirts, but I stopped him from finishing the sentence.

"No…yes…no… that's not the main reason, please just don't ask right now, it's personal okay? What am I supposed to do now, I got no place, no family, no money, hell, I just ruined this expensive kimono belonging to Uchiha clan, and I'm not even sure I'm worth that much, but now I have to pay for it. Fuck, I really fucked up everything, and now, Itachi had to… Damn it, now he had to take my place. He couldn't do that, no, actually he could, he would change to anything for my sake, but he shouldn't, he is too kind to stay in Anbu, unlike me, who's soul was already tainted even before I was born. Damn it, I fucked up, maybe I should just go back and fix it. What's my life worth compare to his? So why, why don't I have the courage to do it when the best answer is right in front of me…"

"Stop!" I felt Shun's hand clenched arm on my shoulder to stop me from the endless and crazy rambling I had. My knees felt weak, weaker than I've ever felt before. I felt the hot and scorching tears falling out of my eyes, but I couldn't stop it. _Why, Why is it that I had every pro and con planned out, found the solution of a lesser sacrifice, but I couldn't do it? Gosh, I'm such a coward._

"No, I really fucked up everything, Shun. I was so selfish to leave the back hole, that I dragged Itachi and Sasuke with me. Now Itachi would never be able to walk the light again, and father will ruin Sasuke just like he did with us." I said quietly. I had never felt this powerless before, maybe once when Daichi's was killed and I couldn't do anything, but during then, I didn't know the importance of bonds. But now, after everything I felt like I had a family, but I just had to fuck everything up.

"Stop, just stop for a second. I have no idea what you just said, but if Daichi was here, he would shamelessly say 'I have no clue what you just said, but I'm sure it will work out, cause you've got the awesome Daichi with you', or something cheesy like that. So stop for a second. You are thinking too much right now, go take a shower and change your freaking wet clothes. Then we'll talk about it when you actually feel better." Shun said calmly as he gave me a change of clothes and motioned me to the bathroom. I walked slowly toward the bathroom, having nothing better to do.

"Aww, I'm so sorry, Hatake-san, I kinda have a bit of emergency at my end here, but could we talk again later?" I heard Shun asked the Anbu.

"It's alright, you don't need to ask me again, I'll be one of your recommendations. I'll leave now so you can deal with your… crisis." and with that, he disappeared like the wind.

I closed the shower and started to take off the clingy fabric. I had no idea why I turned up at Shun's place, as I'd only been here once before. Shun's parents both passed away, and he seemed to be living on the Clan's subsidiary along with his own mission money. So when we started to take on more C-rank missions after Itachi joined, he moved out of the Yamanaka shared compound and moved into his own apartment. I thought, Shun, in his own way, was trying to stand out on his own, rather than just being identified as a Yamanaka, despite being only 14 years old right now. Somehow, my mind was blank when I ran, unsure of where to go, Shun's name popped up in my head and automatically I ran toward his place.

I hopped into the shower and let the water soak away my tears. It's warm and comfortable, along with nice minty scents. It was not going to wash away all my uncertainty and guilt, but it did manage to calm me down a bit. I turned the water off and proceeded to dry myself and put on the oversized T-shirt and pajama pants. I looked at my reflection in the mirror, it was a small petite body, lean like a stick but there were trained muscles adorned my limbs and torso. There was still baby fat on my cheek, and my black hair fell a little lower past my shoulders, slightly wavy. I looked so different from my previous life, although I also had similar black hair with similar length in my previous life, that's where the similarity ended. Unlike the oriental features the Uchiha had, my previous face contained the unique beauty and disharmony from being a mix-blood between East and West. Unlike the black as night pupils I have this life, I used to have an interesting shade of gray as my iris. I had a strange feeling that as time progresses, except for the face, I would grow similar to my old body, lined with trained lean muscle, along with scars that adorned my body.

Finally, I walked out of the bathroom door again. Shun motioned me to go sit by the table, I did and he passed me a cup of green tea. "Are we ready to talk about it?" He asked gently.

"No." I said under my breath.

"That's fine, we can drink the tea." he said.

After a moment of silence, I finally asked the question in my mind, looking for a distraction, "Why was Hatake Kakashi here, drinking tea with you?"

"I thought you might ask. Remember when you asked me if I figured out my dream, well, I at least have a direction now. I want to go to intelligence division. Although I used to hate the idea of being lumped into sensory and information gathering just because I have the last name of Yamanaka, I realized in the Chunin exam that my strength indeed lies in my mind-body techniques and my sensory talents. Even though I might be able to hold my own in battle using the little tricks I developed, I think my true potential lies in being support. I'm still going to work on my combat skill, I'm still young after all, but I would like more training in my information gathering skills. This is the path I've chosen myself." He said with conviction.

"In order for me, a newly promoted chunin to at least get the chance to apprentice there, I need the recommendation from two jonins, since it's a highly specialized and secretive unit. I already asked Akira-sensei, and he agreed. I would have asked Inoichi-sama for the other recommendation, but I don't want to pull the favour just because I'm a Yamanaka. So with Akira-sensei's suggestion, I thought to ask Hatake-san, he's a jonin, and he had seen my performance in the chunin exam. So, apparently, he said yes just as he was leaving, so that's settled." He finished explaining and continued to drink his tea.

"That's good, I'm glad at least one of us is getting somewhere." I said quietly, I knew he understood that by "us", I meant the original team six.

"Yeah, so let's talk about you. I mean, sorry to burst your bubble, but you are going to fix this somehow. The Uchiha Maiko I know would never run away, she would just tactically retreat and hack the enemy down later in the most brutal method I know." Shun said.

"Well, the Uchiha Maiko you knew never faced the real problem. My dream… It's… freedom." I formed that word slowly, the one word that encompassed all, "The ability to do what I wanted, if the environment is harsh, the I will become strong and survive, no, beat it all. If the shackles of the clan are too hard, then I will pull until it breaks. But the abyss of Anbu, it's so deep, that I had a feeling that if I ever enter it (again), I will never break out of it." I said. It's not a feeling, but a fear from past experience.

"You seemed like you are in a dilemma, you want the 'freedom', but you are afraid that if you try to pursue it, others will have theirs taken away. But it seemed to me that you are wrong about 'freedom', it's not something you have to pursue alone. Sure you can try to do that, isolating yourself so you can't be affected by anything, but that's not freedom to me, that's loneliness. Freedom is something you enjoy with others, knowing you have the power to do anything you can for them, and they can do whatever they can for you." Shun paused, letting his words sink in. _Freedom… is with others?_

"You are right, you are selfish, in pursuit of your own ideal of freedom, you took away Itachi's freedom, but not the way you think. You are not giving him a chance to do what he wants for you. He is gaining his own freedom by choosing to give you freedom as well, why do you try to force it away? But ultimately, it's your choice, your decision." Shun finished his tea and went to put his cup away. Just then, his home phone rang.

"Hi, it's Yamanaka Shun… yeah… she's here… okay… wait, what?... Fine, you owe me one." Shun hang up the phone after their brief conversation and turned to me, "So, your brother just called, no idea how he got my number, but that's not the point. He said that there's something he needs to give you, so go meet him tomorrow at 11 am at 'that place', wherever that is. He said you would know. Anyways, you can stay here for the night.

"On the couch, Maiko, I don't care if you are a girl, you hit me all the same, so the couch is the best I can do, and that's taking your brother's scariness into account." He pointed towards the couch.

"Thank you, Shun, for everything. That speech, though, I would have though Daichi left you a script." I gave him a weak smile.

"Oh come on, my speech was so much more refined than his, but yeah, it's probably his idea from the start." Shun said.

The lights were out, and I have one night to decide what I want to do, what I want to accept and what I want to give up. Shun's right, it's all my decision.

* * *

I arrived at 'that place' at around 10:30 in the morning. The special spot was actually an old training ground Shisui used to take us when we train together. I believed that Shisui and Itachi frequented that place a lot more than me since I had very little time after Akira-sensei started to train me in kenjutsu, but Shisui's knowledge and teaching style seemed to fit Itachi a lot better, so they came here a lot to train.

I wasn't really surprised seeing Itachi already here, it's so like him, to be one step of everyone. He approached me quickly and placed a few things in front of me. They were everything I owned for myself, so basically weapons. I strapped the bag of kunai, shurikens, and mini blades to my thigh, and quickly picked up my tantō, Hyakki Yakō. It's a defense mechanism to be armed all the time.

"Mother tried to reason with father, but he wouldn't retract the exile. Don't worry, father won't bother you now, I've agreed to be in Anbu and I doubt that they will reject my application base on my record and skill." Itachi said in his usual stoic voice, but this time, it's not calm or soothing, but rather, it hurt my heart like ice shards. _As I thought, I can't let it go…_

"Stop, Itachi, you don't have to do it, let me join Anbu, it's my job anyway." I said, finally making up my mind. Even after Shun's speech, I couldn't let it go. How could freedom be choosing between two awful solutions? That's not freedom, that's desperation.

Itachi stayed silent for a moment before he spoke up. To my surprise, his voice wasn't stoic and calm this time, it's filled with a mockery so unlike him, "Your job? Do you really think you could do a better job than me. What makes you think that you could survive in Anbu, with the way you are right now." His voice mocked and chilled me to the bone. I looked up and saw his eyes glistening harshly. His eyes had always seemed emotionless, but this time, he seemed icy cold.

"Let's make a bet, Maiko. Remember that you owe me a fight from the Chunin exam, let's have that fight here. Beat me, and you get to do whatever you want, including taking my place in Anbu. But if I win, you just shut up and leave me alone. Leave the Uchiha house and stop meddling with the Clan affair." He proposed, but this voice is more like a command rather than a suggestion. I knew from that moment that I wouldn't able to refuse.

"Now, draw your blade, Maiko, unlike before, I won't hold back. Think of this as a death match, because that's what Anbu does. Come with all you got, and I'll show you just how much you lack." He said coldly, and then, he charged.

* * *

Author: so who hates me after the first 200 words? *Everybody raises their hands.

Author: So who still hates me after the chapter? *Tables flipping and author screaming.

Yeah, I know, I am so evil(tables crashing towards the author, author: imsorryimsorryimsorryimsorryimsorryimsorryimsorry...), but you know, I don't feel like writing a half-assed fighting scene where none of them get to have fun because of external influences. Besides, I finished the outline of part one before I wrote the story, so... Anyway, the fight will definitely happen next chapter, so it is going to be exciting! (Tables flipping and author screaming, there goes my reputation).

Anyway, thank you for reading! please review, favourite and follow! The next chapter will be up in a week!


	9. Chapter 9 - Existentialism

A/N: The long waited chapter 9 is finally here. I would get it done sooner, if not for the school (cries in the closet with my beta, who experience the same sleep deprivation as me), but still, I got it done on Saturday!

As many of you may know, the review system went a bit wonky last Saturday, so I wasn't able to reply to many of the comments. But now they are fixed, and I see all of them! Thank all of you who bothered to take precious time to review, and they make my heart cries out in joy! I don't even know how to respond to many of your questions, without spoiling the content, so I might as well just post the next chapter ^_^. Regardless, I love all of you readers!

Beta'd by Alice J, whose dedication to correct my grammars even if we are buried by home works deserves a standing ovation.

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Chapter 9 - Existentialism

 _[noun:_ _a philosophical theory or approach that emphasizes the existence of the individual person as a free and responsible agent determining their own development through acts of the will.]_

* * *

He launched at me at full speed with a sharp kunai in hand. Despite the shock, I still managed to draw the tantō and blocked the attack. The metal clanged against each other for a second before they broke apart.

Itachi was serious about the fight, and I was too. With us Uchihas, in this period, the best way to solve arguments was always with strength. He was trying to stop me, and I was trying to show him that I could take on the burden.

I charged at him with my sword, aiming for the thigh and the knee cap. I took a swing at his leg, and he jumped up to avoid it. Meanwhile, he brought his leg down in a scissor kick, and I turned my body to narrowly avoid the kick. I swung my sword up again and felt it hit something, but quickly I retracted the sword once I realize it's a replacement technique. I rolled away to avoid being crushed by the log.

Immediately a wave of shuriken flew from my left, I quickly repositioned myself and hit each shuriken away with my sword. After a few clinking of the metal, there were no more shurikens. I made a few seals with my left hand and gathered fire chakra in my throat, then I spit out a few dozen small fireballs and sent them flying toward Itachi. When I first got the sword, I was practicing how to do one hand seal and trying to reduce the number of seals needed to activate the ninjutsu, now I was able to use one hand sea for a few easy fire ninjutsu. To my surprise, instead of using water ninjutsu to get rid of the fireballs, Itachi also sent the exact number of fireballs back at me. I narrowed my eyes, seeing that they are not fireballs but rather shuriken embedded with fire chakra, it's a further developed ninjutsu of Katon: Phoenix sage flower. The fireballs and the fire shurikens crashed. The fire chakra on his shuriken dimmed after crashing with mine, but the shuriken kept going, heading toward me. Once again, I hit them away, dodging the ones still had flames on them. I moved closer toward Itachi, knowing that if I couldn't catch him in close combat, I would definitely lose.

I use body flicker and appeared behind him. Just as he turned, I grabbed his right arm and twisted it in an unnatural manner. I heard the familiar popping sound and Itachi's grunt, before he kicked me in the ribs. I managed to cling on to his body and use the force from his kick to swing my leg up, then latched them onto his head. I pushed my body up again and letting one of my knees choking on his throat and the other leg around his neck.

The moment I locked onto him, his left hand shot up, revealing a molten red hand. I dodged the palm coming for my head, trying my hardest to hang on to him, tightening my legs around his neck. Then, he fell on purpose, sending me to the ground. I was stunned by the impact for a moment, and that's when his palm came toward me again. Unfortunately, I had to let go of his neck and roll away.

When I stood up again, Itachi sent a water release wave at me. I wasn't sure how I would counter that, even though the water slows down my movement, it was a small effect and temporary. I thought people only use this technique for sensing. Unfortunately Itachi had better ideas, just when I was about to jump to a tree from the water, he appeared in the water and grabbed my ankle. It was a smart idea, even with my Sharingan, it had limit in distinguishing chakra, he would do well to hide in his own chakra water and I wouldn't able to notice that for a moment. As I stumbled, he kicked my in the stomach, knocking the wind out of me and sent me flying toward the sky. As I was gasping for oxygen in mid-air, he body flickered beside me and kicked me again, this time toward the ground.

There was a loud sound of crashing, and I was trying to sit up in a small crater. Yep, there's definitely a rib broken if not two. Immediately, I felt the impending danger as a natural instinct and brought my sword up in defense. The brute force of a kunai pushed my sword back a bit, but I mustered up some strength and pushed it back. I quickly rolled my body away, not wanting to sit in the crater and be the hitting target again. Ah, my body ached, and my breathing was short, probably not gonna die from a punctured lung, but you never knew. Taijutsu was a bad idea, considering our conditions. I had a broken rib or two, along with a few bruises and a few shallow cut on my body. Itachi didn't look any better, with a limping arm dangling, along with a big bruise around his neck, and some cuts on his body from the tantō. I was hoping that dislocating one arm would stop him from making double hand seals. Sadly, I was wrong, he managed to bring his right hand together with his left and forcefully started to perform the seal despite the excruciating pain. I knew for a fact that most of lower level ninjutsu Itachi could perform with one hand or even none, but if he's using two hard, it must be something powerful.

Immediately, I brought my hands up for seals as well. We finished the seals at the same time, four lightning dragon shot out of my hands as one huge fire dragon flew out of his. The lightning and the fire crashed in mid sky, my lightning dragons mingled and twisted around the fire dragon, trying to restrain it and negate it; his fire dragon roared in the air, fighting to overthrow the lightning restraining it's body. There was an explosion, some light and some smoke, and the two ninjutsu negated each other. When the smoke cleared, I looked up in Itachi's direction, and realized that I made a horrible mistake when I saw the overwhelming redness of his eyes. This was Itachi, and his genjutsu was leagues above mine.

I gasped and screamed, willing my own sharingan to break free of whatever illusion he had planned for me. I was careless, thinking just because I also had sharingan that his eyes wouldn't affect me. It was like trying to stay afloat in a thick, murky water, even with my sharingan spinning furiously trying to counter his, it was like the effort of a cup of water on a house of fire. _When did his genjutsu become this powerful?_ I had no answer for that, and apparently, no solution for it either.

I felt my world warp into non existence… Then I saw, I saw myself clad in black, along with others in the same attire. No… How did he know? How did he know OLYMPUS? I felt a wave of fear and panic wrapped around me. It was a painful thing, watching yourself killing others from a third-person point of view. One thing became clear when I saw myself breaking other's neck, stabbing people's hearts and destroying their brain stem in one swift motion, I was not in OLYMPUS, I was in Anbu. I watched as the erie white mask covered my face, yet I knew for that that this was me. So dreadful, the death around me, the death caused by me and the death because of me. I saw my 'comrade' died one by one yet I couldn't shed a single tear. Everything was so bleak and black, every kill felt so quick and common it's terrifying. Was he trying to show me that my future in Anbu would be this bleak, showing me that I was terrified of what will happen if I cluelessly took on the job. Ah, he was right, despite all the killing I did in previous life, I wished that I could leave it behind. I was a coward, for trying to run away from the sins I committed, as if being reborn would have erased that. I was a coward, for forcing my own heart, that Itachi had to put me into a genjutsu to show me that. That was the last thought that crossed my mind before my world went black.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

"Did you really have to do this, that genjutsu was a horrible move." Shisui said to Itachi as he jumped into the cliff behind the training ground with a limping arm.

"If not, how could she understand." Itachi responded, "Help me set this arm back, Shisui, otherwise my arm will be ruined."

"You guys sure don't hold back, by the way, I think we need to check your trachea, your neck is purple." Shisui said as he held onto Itachi's arm and pushed it back with a strong force. Itachi grunted because of the pain.

"I did hold back; she held back as well. Despite what I said, there's no way we could kill each other. But that doesn't matter now, I got my point across." Itachi answered as he rolled his arm gently to test the damage.

"Are you sure about going into Anbu, I know I must be annoying asking you after so many had already done so before. But let me lay it out for you, Maiko's argument. It's true her skill would have been much suited in Anbu, her taijutsu was born for assassination, even I could see that much. I don't know how, but I felt like she has been thoroughly trained in that skill. I know you are a genius and you would pick up things faster than I can blink, but if there's one word that describes you, it's 'kind' and Anbu doesn't need 'kind'. You would be leaving everything behind, breaking your family's heart, especially Maiko's heart." Shisui laid it out clearly, and then he proceeded to wrap Itachi's injury with dressings.

"Choosing between different choices, that's life. So often I didn't have a chance to choose before the decision's been made for me. But now, I can choose. This is my decision, my choice, my freedom. What Maiko felt was the guilt of fearing I had no choice. But that's not true, I did, and I made my choice. It's my freedom and I'm glad I have it." Itachi said in a deep voice, eyes following the direction where he left his sister.

"That's fine then. Just a heads up, the clan elders will be asking me to 'keep an eye' on you. So whatever you're going to do, just make sure you got a damn good cover story I can use." Shisui warned, they all knew what 'keep an eye' meant, and Itachi wasn't really surprised by it.

"Let's go, she should be waking up soon. After this fight, she should be able to enjoy her freedom, while I take pride in mine." The conversation ended here as the two teenage boys disappeared in blurs.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

When I woke up again, Itachi was gone. I could still feel my broken rib, and the pain was probably a sign that I needed to get it looked at. _He is still soft about the death match,_ I thought. Even though he said he won't hold back, he did, or I wouldn't be getting off with just a few broken ribs.

I stood up, and for the first time, noticing the long rectangular box in front of me. I picked up the box and I noticed a familiar feeling while holding it. Carefully, I opened the box. My eyes widened when I saw a ninjatō with the familiar colour of teal. I quickly grabbed Hyakki Yakō beside my leg and compared the two blades. They have the same teal fabric wrapped around their hilt, same guardless design and the same teal sheath. The ninjatō obviously had a longer blade than the tantō, but the metal felt the same. Unlike the craving of an oni on the blade near the hilt, the ninjatō had a carving of five-petal cherry blossom. There was a card in the box, it only said one word: Senbonzakura (Thousand cherry blossoms), in mom's handwriting.

I carefully put Senbonzakura as well as Hyakki Yakō in the box and hugged it close to my chest. It was mom's promise, she didn't blame me for leaving, but rather, she wished that I could use the blades to protect myself while doing what I wanted to do. A single drop of warm tear fell from my eye. I must be getting soft, since I just cried twice within 24 hours when I only consciously cried once during the past nine years of my life (add another 12 years if you want to count my previous life).

Quickly, I walked toward the hospital while holding the box that contained the embodiment of my mom's love. I looked toward the Hokage's tower, rising above all the buildings, wondering If Itachi would be fine. After all, everything he did was for me. _He will be fine, he's stronger than me. He will be fine_. With that belief echoed in my mind, I continued walking.

"A broken rib and few bruises, how did you get it again?" The medic asked me suspiciously.

"Ehh, I fell down training?" I said uncertainly.

"Kids these days. Alright, no big problem, I've set it back, take it light for a few days. Give me your parent's number, I need to call them to inform them of your injury." She asked.

She looked so serious that I didn't think I could get out of it, but I was pretty sure that I couldn't just give her the Uchiha compound number. I sighed and debated for a moment before giving her a name.

After half an hour, I was waiting in front of the hospital, not sure if I should keep waiting or just leave. When I looked up again, I saw the familiar sandy brown hair and the jonin vest approaching me. Akira-sensei was here.

"I'd never took you for the trouble type, Maiko, what happened?" He asked me with a serious voice.

"A lot of stuff happened, but long story short, I got exiled from the clan." I paused a bit, he didn't look that surprised, so I could assume that Shun had already told him, so I continued, "The real question is, sensei, are you willing to teach me, let me be your apprentice?"

He looked thoughtful for a second, it would have gave me a scare with the way he was hesitating, but at this moment, I was too tired to be scared. However, he quickly smiled and looked a bit smug. He said: "I thought you'd never ask. I already petitioned to the Hokage about your assignment right after the Chunin exam. Now, it's officially approved that you will be my apprentice until further assignment. As your Shishou, I will train you and I will decide what mission you go on. So now, what do you say, my apprentice?"

"Thank you Shishou!" I beamed at him brightly, pushing out every ounce of happiness left in me and gave him a big bow.

"So what are you going to do now? Where are you gonna live?" Akira-sensei - wait, it was shishou now - sat beside me, waiting for me to answer the question of the day.

"I have no idea. Itachi brought me all my stuff, which is not much. I have a few sets of kunai and shuriken, some mini blades, some explosive tags that I never use. I have two swords on me, and I also have some money on me that I earned from all the missions. Shishou, do you think I could buy a tent and camp out on the training ground?" I asked.

"Why do you sound so poor? You have your teammate with you. No, you can't camp out in the training ground. Go crash with Shun for a few days before you get a mission paycheck and find your own place; despite how much he'll complain, he won't mind." He said, "Meet me at the training ground 6 at 1900 today. I see you've got a second sword, good, I hope you know I was serious about fixing your kenjutsu. Trust me, with your current skill in kenjutsu, don't you dare go out there and say you are my student."

"Ah, Shishou you are the best. Don't worry, I don't plan on wasting your kenjutsu lessons. So this is it, a new chapter in my life, usually, it sounds so poetic." I stared at the sky, ignoring the weird look my teacher gave me.

"Just be glad this new chapter is starting out in a positive direction. You may not always be this lucky. Seven at training ground 6, don't be late." That's the last thing I heard before Akira-shishou walked away.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

Akira-shishou beat the crap out of me with a bokken against my two metal blade that evening. Although part of it was because I wasn't familiar with the ninjatō, nor was I familiar with the two hand kenjutsu. Nevertheless, I was beaten to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

My body was full of slashes and bruises, from the fast striking sword play Shishou performed. Even with a wooden sword, the speed and power of which he struck were enough to leave cut marks on me.

"Your grip and strength is lacking. Usually, your speed makes up for what your strength lacks, and you aim for spots that are vulnerable. But what would happen if your opponent's speed exceeds yours? Well, this is what happens. You are too reliant on your close combat skills, but right now, they won't work their full potential. So from now on, you are only allowed to use pure kenjutsu when you are training with me. Practice your close combat in your free time, but now, you need to bring your kenjutsu up to speed." He said harshly, but everything he said was right on point. I moved painfully to pick up the scattered sword, stood up once again, and got back to the starting position.

Strike, hit, block and slash, that's the routine from seven to ten. Akira-shishou already told me that he was not going to baby train me, now that I'm officially under the tutelage of Shinbara, and I couldn't agree more. By the time the training session was finished, I was dead from head to toe.

"Get up, it's time to go home. But before you go, I need to talk to you about something." Akira said as I picked up my body and walked next to him.

"I can teach you kenjutsu and other basic skills, and it seemed to be that your taijutsu already had a full system that you can practice, and that will be enough for now. However, your talent in ninjutsu should not be forgotten, but my affinity is water, so it would be hard for me to teach you ninjutsu full time. So instead, I found someone else to help." he said, "so come here tomorrow at seven in the morning, actually, eight should be fine. You guys can work out the details."

"Wait what?" I asked, but there were no answers, seeing Shishou had already taken off.

When I arrived at the training ground at seven, there was no one in sight. I leaned on a tree and waited. I felt the time passing, one hour, two hours. Suddenly, I felt a presence looming over me, without any hesitation, I drew my ninjatō and slashed at the shadow above me.

There was a sound of metals clinking, and then my sword was stopped by another sword. When I saw the owner of the sword, I resisted the urge to curse out loud, but seriously, Akira-shishou? Seriously?

"That's not how one should greet people." Kakashi of the sharingan said emotionlessly.

"If one wants to be greeted properly, they should make themselves known first before creeping out the other." I responded, still holding onto the blade, refusing to let go.

"What if it's your Shishou, do you still point blades at him?"

"Shishou doesn't creep up on people from trees, and you are clearly not Shishou. It always pays to be vigilant."

"Ah, fine, I was just trying to gauge your attention, after all, you are one of Akira-senpai's prized students." Finally, he put his blade back to its sheath, and we proceeded back to our staring contest. If not for the fact that we didn't use the sharingan, one might though we were in some intense genjutsu competition.

"So, Hatake-san, I take it you are here on Shishou's request? Why, though? You hardly seem to like children, and I'm sure you are quite busy." I asked, still staring at him.

"A few reasons here and there, one does not simply ignore a senpai's request." He responded, not moving his visible eye either.

"I'm just going to say it out in the open, Hatake-san. I respect your skills, and if you are really willing to teach me, then I must be winning a jackpot or something. But I'm sure you already heard my little rant earlier in Shun's place, and I don't think any Anbu operative will like my speech." I said, "I just want to be clear, that I don't hate any Anbu operative, or the people running it. I understand that for a hidden village like ours to work, an agency like Anbu is necessary, in fact I think it's a smart decision to set up a black ops division. However, while I understand it, I also find it hard to accept. So if you are still willing to teach me after that, then I will thank you in advance for all your time and effort." A little bits of lie here and there, I didn't find Anbu hard to accept, I just wanted to run away from it, as fast as I could, as far as I could.

"Sprouts out the harsh truth on the first meeting, interesting. It's fine, when I agreed to Akira-senpai's request, I already understand your view towards us. Although I must say that your claims were different from the hatred that I thought you'd bear." he said, giving me a smile for a first time, even though it's hard to tell if that's really a smile considering his mask.

"What, you thought I'd hate Anbu because of my comrade's death? No, Daichi's death was unfortunate. At first, I did complain about the unfairness of the whole event, but somehow, I've come to accept it as it is. Still hurts, though, the feeling that I've somehow failed him. Speaking of which, I should probably thank you, for saving my life. If you didn't skewer that Kiri-nin, I would probably have been cut in half." I laughed dryly.

"I'm surprised that you remembered me, I was sure that all my distinct features were hidden behind a mask."

"I just thought the figure seemed familiar, nothing more than an instinct. So you are really going to train me?" I asked with a smile.

"I wouldn't really say 'train', more like 'instruct'. As you already guessed, I am an Anbu Captain, and I'm on active missions, which means I can only teach you when I'm not on a mission. I can only teach you once a week, maybe at most two times in between missions. Sometimes, I have to leave the village for weeks, even months. I will give you instructions on ninjutsu, especially lightning nature, but for most of the time, you need to work on your own, practice as much as you can." Suddenly, his voice turned serious. Unconsciously, I stood up straight under the aura of a Captain.

"I understand. So what should I call you, Hatake-sensei?" I asked, shaking off the heavy air around me.

"Just call me Kakashi-sensei, Hatake-sensei makes me sound so old." Suddenly, his demeanor returned to a casual setting.

"Okay, Kakashi-sensei, what do you plan to teach me now?"

"Lightning chakra, my favorite." …

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

Time Skip: Two Years (Maiko: 11, Itachi: 12, Shun: 16, Sasuke: 6)

"Hurry up, Shun! I'm gonna be late for the mission!" I screamed as I pound the bathroom door, out of all the foresight I had, why didn't I thought about this?

"Just wait, I haven't even been using it for long!" A voice yelled from the other side of the door and I just rolled my eyes at the statement.

"Not long? Are you kidding me, you've been using it for at least 20 minutes, how long does it take to tie your hair?" I yelled again, clenching my fist to keep my anger in check.

"Your mission doesn't start for another fifteen minutes, with your speed and body flicker, you will be fine!" Shun yelled again, and this time, I snapped. One thing you learned from renting a cheap two bedroom/one bathroom apartment in Konohagakure was that if you turn the bathroom doorknob hard enough, it will eventually open.

I grabbed the doorknob and poured my chakra into my hand, I twisted the knob until I heard an unnatural click, Before he could stop me, I opened the door and rushed into the bathroom.

"Hey!" Shun yelled, but I forcefully took a stand in front of the mirror and started to brush my teeth and fix my hair.

"Come on, we can share. I'll be fast and you can continue doing whatever you are doing for 20 minutes." I said as I tied up my in a ponytail, put on my Hitai-ate and let the bangs fall on it along with my two strands of hair that framed my face. "See, five minutes not even, and my hair is done, what's with yours?" I commented and Shun rolled his eyes at me.

"I don't know why you are so twitchy about this, it's not your first B-rank mission." Shun asked. It's true that over the last two years, I've completed four B-rank missions already, but…

"But it's the first one that Akira-shishou will not accompany me. So it's just me and three other Chunin." I claimed.

"But it's just a scout and elimination, right? Some disturbance over the border village, multiple missing targets, none found dead. Possibly a B-rank criminal engaging in human trafficking. Mission objective: Identify the threat and eliminate on sight. Standard B-rank stuff, you should be fine." Shun listed out the mission specific, he's always quick on getting the information now that he's in the intelligence department, training under the famous Yamanaka Inoichi himself.

"Right, but I don't to be late, nor do I want to mess up the mission, considering there are those who decided that my age doesn't match up to the rank." I said as I finished all the clean ups. I checked the time, ten more minutes, I should be on time.

"Well, tell them to back off. you deserve all your promotions and assignments. Good luck on your mission, your share of this month's rent depends on it." Shun teased as I flipped out of the window and ran to the village gate.

I actually arrived at the meeting position two minutes early, but unfortunately, I was still the last one there. I saw my three teammates standing my the gates, three Chunin shinobi, dressed in standard Konoha chunin vests. I approached and greeted them with the respect I would give to any senpai.

"Uchiha Maiko, report for the B-rank mission at 0730." I said as I dipped my head slightly toward the Chunin in the middle, whose pride stance showed me that he was the temporary leader of this chunin team.

"Finally, at least you are on time. I'm Yoshida Kazuo, Senior Chunin, the team leader for this mission. Since we are all here, we might as well start with introduction just in case some are unfamiliar with each other. State your name, age rank with years, and specialty." the lead chunin, Yoshida said with a false sense of authority. _Age, huh, so we are back to that again,_ I thought.

"I'll start, Yoshida Kazuo, 27 years old, chunin for 12 years, my specialty is taijutsu." He said proudly like he was very happy at being static for 12 years. His body build was on the bulky side so I could see why he favoured taijutsu.

"I'm Maki Kichirou, 21 years old, chunin for 8 years, the specialty is tracking and scouting." the second man with short choppy black hair said. If what he said was true then he would be very useful in this mission, as we were required to track down the perpetrator from just the signs of missing body.

"I'm Takuma, Ito Takuma. I'm 15 years old, chunin for 2 years, my specialty is medical jutsu. This is my first B-rank mission, please take care of me!" The innocent looking teenage boy said nervously as he bowed to the two older chunin. Newly promoted chunin usually don't get B-rank mission until they were chunin for two years, the only reason I got to go on my first B-rank mission after only eight months of being promoted was because I was under the apprenticeship of Jonin Shinbara, and he allowed me to tag on some missions (I swear I was useful).

"My name is Uchiha Maiko, 11 years old, Chunin for 2 years, my specialty is kenjutsu and ninjutsu. Nice to meet you." I bowed slightly as well, I still remembered mom's lesson on the manner and proper behaviour. Generally speaking, the team was well placed, two combat fighter, one tracker and one medic in case we found any missing person need medical treatment.

"Are we so tight on shinobi that they have to send newbie kids now? Oi, little girl, are you sure you can do this, this is a B-rank mission, you can still back out." The leading chunin mocked. I knew this would happen, but I kept the smile on my face and said: "I will be fine, thank you for your concern. I believe we should be moving along now."

Soon, the little fiasco was over and we took off, heading toward the few villages near the land of rivers, where the disturbance was reported. Now that we were all Chunin, our traveling speed was much faster. I estimated that it would only take us two days max to arrive at the scene.

During the night, we put on the shift rotation for the night watch. For some reason, they thought I wasn't competent enough to keep a watch by myself, so they pitted me with the medic, Ito Takuma. He was nervous, I could tell that much even without the sharingan. His hands kept twitching and he seemed to be sitting in a closed off position. I ignored him, there was nothing I could do except for him to get used to it. It won't be his last B-rank mission since medic-nins were more in demand these days.

"Is this your first B-rank mission as well?" Takuma asked uncertainly as I scanned the perimeter with my sharingan. He couldn't see the red eyes from his angle, and it's probably best if he couldn't.

"No." I answered briefly. Akira-shishou took me on three other B-rank mission before, two raids and one assassination. Those times, it was only me and Shishou, but we managed to complete it no problem. Although Akira-shishou was the MVP in the raids, I was the one who directed the assassination.

"What, really? But how? You are so young that you looked like one of the academy students." He asked in surprised. I sighed when I heard 'academy students', yeah, like I hadn't heard that before.

"Things happen. Look, if you think I wasn't competent enough, take it up with Hokage-sama, he was the one assigned me to this." I said to him, and he immediately looked guilty for saying that. He shook his head furiously and said quickly: "No, no, no, I didn't mean that. I mean… I mean… you are so young and stuff… No, that came out wrong, I mean… never mind…"

I couldn't help but watch in amusement at his stutters, "It's fine, I'm just joking, lighten up the mood. Don't be nervous now, the real mission starts when we arrive at the village."

"How can you be so calm, we are being sent into the unknown, and we have to eliminate the target. What if they are strong missing-nin?" The teenager asked frantically, but I just left him be.

"We are always being sent into the unknown, no matter how much we think we know. That's why some are lucky while others are not." I muttered quietly when no one could hear me.

* * *

A/N: I do hope that most of you stayed long enough to read this note. Decisions had to be made, how I wanted this fanfic to go, which direction it will lead to... My beta and I had long discussions about this, like literally everywhere. I know that no matter which direction I take, there are always going to be someone that's disappointed, and I hate to disappoint my readers. So in the end, I decided to go with my guts and just write it the way I planned in the beginning, which is the direction that I think will make the most sense.

Spoiler alert! Many of you probably already linked the events in this chapter to the coughcough*massacre* coughcough. Regardless of whether or not the massacre happens, I can promise you a few things:

1\. If the massacre indeed happens, Maiko will not go on a super long revenge journey the way Sasuke did in the canon. I'm sorry, Sasuke, but no matter how cute you were when you were little, in the canon, you are an asshole. I do think my OC is mature and intelligent enough to see behind the facade of the massacre if it ever happens, it might take her a bit long to figure out the "why", but she will not jump to the most obvious conclusion.

2\. The story won't be following the events in canon very closely. Right now, they seems to be going on the rail, but as time passes and Maiko gains the power to do more, they will diverge more and more (some events already diverged, even if it's quite subtle). There is a blank period between now and canon, and I plan to fill those holes with plot instead of time skip.

3\. This story will be long, like we are not even at the beginning of the canon yet, and I doubt we will be there in less than fifteen chapters. I do plan to continue this until the shippuden... as for how long that will be... it will remain a mystery for now.

Sorry for the rant, I just thought I clean up my thoughts a bit and make some clarification for the fanfic. (funny story about the title of this chapter)

Alice J: We've read _ONE_ book for existentialism in English, ONE BOOK.

Author: I'm sorry, it just kind of stuck in my mind, now you see how deep it had infiltrated my thoughts, even to the place where the school was not supposed to reach.

Alice J: Can we not talk about English? (hold up the most recent book we are supposed to read, but never actually got the time to do it.)

Author: (Looking at all the assignment for English we are supposed to do, but never really got to do it) Yeah, good idea, let's not.

Thanks for reading! please leave a review if you feel like it!


	10. Chapter 10 - Marionette

A/N: The brand new chapter is here! The first part of the story - Anchor - will finish soon (up to approximately chapter 14), but that doesn't mean the story is finished. In fact, part two will continue right after that, with no delay in update schedule. From my speech, you've probably guessed that I have a plan, a general structure of the story already mapped out. I just like to do things that way, so it makes me seem organized (I'm really not).

Beta'd by the mighty Alice J. Enjoy ^_^

* * *

Chapter 10 - Marionette

"They just disappeared without a trace. When we woke up in the morning, they were gone." That's the tenth time we heard the same statement. The villagers had no idea how the people disappeared, even if they increased the patrol after the initial disappearance. It looked like they just evaporated into thin air.

"Whoever was doing it, they must be strong shinobi if they could sneak into the village and kidnap villagers without notice." Yoshida concluded as we regrouped at the edge of the village.

"That's if we are assuming it's a human do are doing this. Although given all the evidence, it's unlikely to be any but human. But the problem is, there were no marks to track; all the marks I've been studying belong to the missing people, and they just seemed to be disappearing outside of the village as if they walked out themselves." Maki, the tracker summarized. The strangest point in this case was the fact that the missing people seemed to have disappeared by themselves, there were signs of them walking out of the village, yet no one saw them and no one knew why.

"It's possible that the perpetrator used some large scale genjutsu to lure the victim out themselves, it could be the genjutsu that altered the villagers memory, making them unable to remember anything. If that's the case, then the enemy must be very powerful." Yoshida added, "is there anyway we could detect the genjutsu?"

"I could give it a try." I raised my hand, drawing the attention to myself. They seemed skeptical since I never told them about my specialty being genjutsu. I ignored them as I activated my sharingan. The three tomoe furiously spinning, and I checked the view in front of me carefully. The chakra system of the villagers seemed fine, there was no disturbance. There was no lingering twisted chakra on the village, everything was normal.

"I detect no genjutsu at work at all. Unless the genjutsu was so powerful that they outrank my sharingan. If that's the case then we should ask for back up, since that means the genjutsu would be close to high A-rank, even S-rank." I said as I turned around, there was a temporary shock before I reverted the sharingan back to normal.

"Sha… Sharingan." Maki exclaimed in a surprised tone. I wasn't sure why they were surprised because I clearly told them my last name was Uchiha. Yoshino was the fastest to recover, he ordered: "Okay, we will keep a lookout in this village for tonight, maybe the perpetrator will strike again, and then we will be able to catch them. Uchiha and Ito will patrol in the village for now. Maki will keep working on tracking, and I will patrol the outside. We will regroup at dusk." All of us nodded, then we dispersed to our positions.

"So we are just gonna stand here and wait?" A bored medic nin asked beside me as we stood by one of the village houses.

"That's not necessarily true, but I couldn't think of anything else we could do at this moment." I answered. After the fifth time surveying the village with sharingan on, there was nothing significant I could find. Sharingan could see details and distinguish chakra, but they are not sensor specific, meaning there were limits as to what they can sense. Sharingan was best used for seeing chakra in the human body system, it enabled us to distinguish genjutsu, and to an extent, copy ninjutsu based on the chakra flow. However, its use is decreased when the chakra leaves the body and lingers in the air. There were faint traces of chakra residue in the air, but they were so faint that no large ninjutsu could caused it. They seemed really old that I couldn't follow it, but it's the main proof that it was shinobi at work here.

"Ehh, I think there is someone following us. I can just feel the eyes staring at us." Takuma said, I immediately turned around, but only after a second, I relaxed again.

"There are children peeking behind the wall." I said to him emotionlessly, and he looked slightly embarrassed. I checked out the children again, there were three to be exact, and all seemed to be around five or six. They were looking at us with a mix of genuine curiosity and a hint of fear.

"Although they do seem to be wanting to approach us for whatever reason. Stay here" I said to Takuma before I quietly body flickered away. When I stopped moving, I was behind the trio of kids.

"Come on, they are here. If you want to say something, hurry up!" one of the children urged the boy in the middle, speaking in a volume that seemed to be whisper for them, but a radio for shinobi.

"Shh, quiet, they will hear you. I don't know, I don't think they will believe me," the boy in the middle said timidly.

"Whatever, just hurry up, or the adult will catch us" The first children spoke again, nudging the boy in the middle harder this time.

"Hey guys, I can't see one of them." The third children whispered, trying to catch the other two's attention.

"What do you mean you can't see, where did she go?" the boy in the middle asked in a panic, and I decided that this was the time to intervene.

"What do you want to tell us?" I asked in the nicest, least creepy voice possible, but they still managed to jump and shriek at my presence.

"When did you… How did you… you were there…" the first boy mumbled an incoherent sentence, clearly surprised and baffled by my appearance.

"Is that… is this ninja power?" The middle boy asked with amazement.

"Yes, it's ninja power. I'm sorry I scared you, but you guys seemed to be wanting to tell me something, so I couldn't stop my curiosity. I'm Maiko, what about you?" I smiled at them. Clearly, my years of child rearing experience with Sasuke had its uses. Speaking of Sasuke, he was six now and he started the Academy this year. I don't have much time seeing him now that I was exiled from the Clan, but mom was kind enough to bring him out and meet me at least once a month, and sometimes, I would catch up with Sasuke when he was off from the Academy.

"I'm Bunta." the first boy said, "Kei." the middle boy said timidly, "Ryuji." the third child called out.

"Well, nice to meet you all, but would you mind telling me what you wanted to say?" I asked, not sure what to expect for the answer,

"The adult won't believe us, but I saw! I saw my mother took my father away!" Kei yelled out in a hurry and I widened my eyes, not following the clearly important revelation.

"Hold on, tell me from the beginning, what do you mean your mother took your father?" I asked and Kei lowered his head.

"It all started a few days ago, when people started to go missing and the adults were panicking. Mom went missing five days ago, she just disappeared and we never saw her again, until two nights ago. I couldn't sleep because I want to go to toilet, so I got out of bed. When I came back, I swear I saw mom in our room. I was surprised so I stopped moving. I want to yell out to mom, but she seemed different, and I was really scared, so I hid by the toilet. I saw mom picking up dad who was asleep and they flew out and disappeared. When I went out of the house, they were all gone. The next morning, my dad was declared missing as well, but no adult had saw any of them at all, even the uncles patrolling the village!" Kei yelled out quickly, he looked terrified. By his eager look, I'd guess that the adults didn't believe him when he told them.

"Thank you Kei. Be careful okay, I believe you and I'm going to tell my teammates about it. For tonight, stay together, and no matter who tries to make you follow them, don't do it and scream for help okay?" I said to the boys and they nodded before running away. I immediately walked to Takuma and said: " You got the signal scroll, I just got some new information, and we need to gather up and discuss it before the night falls." He seemed confused, but nevertheless, he followed the instructions. He pulled out a plain looking scroll and opened it, immediately the scroll went poof. The signal scroll allows the others who has the same scroll to get the location if one of the scrolls was opened, and now we just had to wait for the team to gather.

"This better be important, little girl, those scrolls are expensive." Yoshida said annoyingly as he and Maki showed up. For the time being, I let the insults slide and told them what Kei told me. The reason why adults didn't believe him was because his story seemed so impossible to them. But we were trained shinobi, with chakra and ninjutsu, nothing was impossible.

"Genjutsu on the kidnapped?" Maki suggested.

"Could work, but it doesn't explain how a civilian woman was able to pick up her husband and move away at fast speed." I added.

"Possession? Or even drugs to induce strength, like soldier pills?" Yoshida proposed.

"Or it could be possible that the woman seen was not actually the real one, like a disguise or something. Could explain why victim made no sound, and why I only found traces of the victims leaving the village." Maki said.

"Either way, the perpetrator will have to be close to the village. Maki, can you track now?" Yoshida asked, but Maki shook his head "I need a general direction, right now, the tracks are all over the place, I won't be able to track such a large area." Yoshida looked thoughtful for a second and then he asked me "What about Sharingan, can you see any existing chakra signature?"

I shook my head and said "No, my sharingan doesn't range that far, and it could only see concentrated chakra like human chakra system well. The chakra left in the air is too thin for me to follow." My team seemed deflated a bit, but suddenly I remembered something, "But, I might be able to get a general direction of where he or she might be." I said as I started doing a string of hand seals and my teammates watched carefully.

"Raiton: Flash Butterfly" I said as dozens of flashing and sparking butterflies few out of my hand into different directions. This technique didn't really have any attack power, since it's a sensory technique I begged Shun to teach me. The butterfly act as sensors to surrounding areas, and they could only be popped by physical or chakra attacks. While Shun could use the pure chakra forms that were less 'flashy', I needed to incorporate my lightning nature to make it last long enough. As a result, it's pretty much a useless technique that was anything but covert.

"I should get the direction of any hostile foreign party in the surrounding area. But I pretty much told them we are looking for them." I said to my teammates, and Yoshida nodded, figured anything was better than no direction at all.

Suddenly I felt the clear sensation of one of my butterfly popped, "three o'clock direction, about 500 meters away, Can't pinpoint the exact location or how many enemy." I said concisely. Yoshida nodded and ordered: "Stealth mode everyone. Maki lead with tracking, Uchiha and me will take the left and right flank, Ito stay at the back. Are we clear?" Everyone nodded. Finally Yoshida said: "Alright people, let's get this sucker before nightfall."

Maki's tracking skill really was no joke; once I pointed out the general direction, he was able to isolate the tracks that were most likely and followed it meticulously. Give him a year or two, he would be able to make at least a tokubetsu Jonin in tracking.

We followed him toward the assumed target as he made careful adjustment to the direction we were going. After around 400 meters, even I could see the disturbed plants due to more tracks and movement. I wondered how we could have missed that during our initial search, but the forest surrounding the village was much more difficult to cover when you only have four people.

"Be careful, the tracks are converging, There's definitely more than a few people here. I don't know if these tracks belong to the kidnappers or the kidnapped, but they are very orderly for some reason." Maki said quietly as we grouped closer. Yoshida and I moved inward, protecting Takuma, our only medic, in the middle while Maki slowed down considerably for us to catch up.

"What number are we looking at here?" Yoshida asked, Maki frowned and concentrated, "Twenty, around twenty-five, that's all I could see from the tracks."

"That seems to be consistent with the number of missing person in the village, but there were only 19 missing, so consider there are at least five targets. We might need back up. Ito, send the messenger hawk. The nearest post is a day away, so we should send one there for immediate backup and send another one back to Konoha to report." Yoshida said after some thought.

"Do we try to engage and apprehend the targets?" I asked, and Yoshida shook his head.

"Not until we had more backup. With our current information, we should consider all the targets shinobi, at least B-rank just to be safe. They also seemed to have jutsu or skills that could either control or impersonate people. Right now, we will be on survey duty, and gather more information on the targets." Yoshida said. Despite his little prejudice against my age, it seemed that his years of experience was not of waste. He was making sure that all of us would survive, seeing how the situation was so unclear.

Takuma immediately nodded and tried to pull out the messenger hawks in bag. Yoshida was writing the notes. When he finished the one to the post, Takuma tied it to the hawk and sent it flying. Suddenly, the hawk was gone, grabbed by something moving at high speed. All of us tensed immediately at the presence of an intruder. My sharingan flared up in an attempt to see better, immediately I saw it, or she moving toward me, still holding the dead hawk in one hand. I pulled out my tantō in a swift motion and slashed across the figure. Despite its speed, it's defense was really weak. With a little help from my sharingan i was able to adjust my body so I was out of its blow but managed to slash its body in half. The moment my blade sliced across the flesh, I realized there were something wrong. There was no blood.

"This is… this is one of the missing person." Maki said in shock as he stared at the upper torso. I stared at it in surprise, it's, in fact, a woman's face, and from the fabric of its cloth and, she was from the village. She wasn't moving anymore, of course, no one would be moving if they were sliced in half. But she was so clean and polished that there was no sign of blood, no sign of any insides spilling out.

"Impossible, how the hell… there is no blood, it seems like her blood has been drained. Her flesh is slightly stiff from the rigor mortis, but there is no sign of discolouration of skin from livor mortis. I can't tell when she died because the body was somehow preserved. But it is no doubt a human body, not some displacement or disguise." Takuma quickly went for an analysis of the body after his initial shock.

"I think the real question is, how is she moving if she was dead enough for rigor mortis." Yoshida pointed out with disbelief. My mind was racing through all the possible options, and then it stopped at one, one possibly terrifying explanation.

"Puppets. Human puppets." I whispered, catching all of my teammate's attention. My head swirled around to see the chakra thread, but they were gone, probably cut the moment I cut the woman down. Instead, what I found made me drew a cold breath.

"Guys, we have company. Lots and lots of company." I said, trying to keep calm. All my teammates tensed up and from their expressions, I knew they realize the same thing I saw. We were surrounded by hostile enemies, very likely the same human puppets we just found.

Once the realisation of puppets dawned on me, I immediately pulled out my ninjatō as well. I let my blades be covered by a thin layer of lightning chakra, I heard the little cracking sounds, humming for the taste of blood. After two years of spontaneous ninjutsu lesson with Kakashi-sensei (whenever he had time), I realized that using lightning chakra to enhance your weapon was a lot more than just adding paralyzing effect. My lightning chakra enhanced swords were a lot more faster, sharper than before. Like wind, lightning was known for its speed; it gave the weapon the illusion that it reaches the target faster due to the lightning coating piercing the target when the blade hadn't actually hit yet. Also, the lightning chakra adds for destructive power. Though it might not be able to slice through steel like butter at this point, but it sure could slice most body flesh open like paper.

The puppets made its first move, they just flooded us. I wasn't sure how many there were, but it's definitely over 25. I slashed the first one open and let its' severed body dropped to the ground, then my other blade separated the shiny blue chakra string that seemed to control it. It became obvious after a while that the only formidable thing about these human puppets were their speed and deadly strikes. However its' speed was nothing a trained shinobi couldn't follow, and its' strike was straightforward and open, thus making them easy to dodge and strike. The only thing that was overpowering us were their sheer numbers.

I destroyed another puppet by hacking it to pieces and dodged a strike from the nearby puppets before turning it to immobile body pieces as well. If they weren't trying to kill me, I might have thought about respect for dead bodies. The third puppet did something different, it opened its jaw to an unnatural angle for human, which just made the whole scene looked very disturbing, and immediately I realized that it's going to shoot out senbon or other projectiles. Quickly I resheathed the tantō in a swift motion in my back, not missing any beat before starting to form the one hand seal for a ninjutsu. "Katon: Fire Dragon Breath" A stream of fire was shot out of my breath and it overwhelmed the senbons (probably melted it) and the puppet that shot them. I proceeded to turn my body and sprayed the fire in a semi circle. When the fire stopped, a row of puppets was incinerated to dust.

From the corner of my eyes, I saw that my teammates were doing fine holding themselves against the puppet hordes. Yoshida was smashing puppets apart with taijutsu, and Maki was fighting with a kunai, occasionally using some earth release technique to trap the puppets. The one doing less well was Takuma, he was struggling to keep up with the number of the puppets fighting. But the other two and I tried to keep as many puppets away from him as possible. Takuma was our only medic, no matter how little fighting power he's got, he's the VIP of the team.

"How many of these… things we have to fight?" Yoshida yelled over all the battle sound, I for one was too busy to answer, between hacking puppets into pieces and shooting out ninjutsus.

"I don't know, they just keep flooding us. There's no way they are all the missing people from the village, there are way too much for that. Where is the one controlling them, because normal civilian don't know how to fight like this." Maki screamed. I scanned the surrounding and all I could see was puppets, puppets, puppets and Chakra threads, thin, crisscrossing chakra thread that seemed to point nowhere in particular. If there were only one puppeteer, then he/she would definitely been considered A-rank, and he/she was smart enough to set up pivot point for the thread to curve over and appeared to be coming from a different location than where he actually was.

"What's the order? Continue to engage or retreat." I yelled, hoping my voice was loud enough.

"We retreat, this is definitely a A-rank enemy, we need backup" Smart decision, puppets spoke of Suna-nin, and human puppets spoke of disastrous Suna missing-nin. I had a flashback of what I saw once in the bingo book, human puppets, could control more than a hundred puppets at once, S-rank Suna missing-nin. Sasori of the Red Sand. Now I was just hoping and praying that it wasn't him. I was confident in my skill, but not confident enough that I would rush in to face S-rank missing-nin. Dying again was not a part of my self-preservation ideology.

"Re-group people!" Yoshida yelled and I quickly slashed apart another puppet before it could shoot senbon at me. I sent another fireball as a follow through just to be sure before I made my way back to the group with Takuma the medic-nin as the center.

"Okay, we need to get away, Maki, we need a earth release for defence, and Uchiha, I really hope you have some big flashy ninjutsu that will immobilize them for a moment so we can get away." Yoshida commanded. Big flashy area of effect ninjutsu? Ahh, I did have some. For the past two years, all I've been doing was basically copy ninjutsu from Kakashi (after much convincing) and pick out the ones I liked then focussing on mastering them.

Just as Maki performed the earth wall, I quickly retracted both of my blades into their sheath behind my back, since biig ninjutsu requires both hands for seals. After a string of hand seals, I pushed my hands into the ground, ignoring the pile of human puppet remains on the ground. "Raiton: Electrifying Web!" I yelled, gathering all my chakra and sent in pulsing through the ground. It would be a pretty sight, seeing the ground light up like ley lines, tracks of lightning dispersing from my hand and reaching out to cover an area diameter of 50 meters. The lightning pattern intertwined like spider webs, crackling and sizzling as it connects with each other. Whenever the lighting lines came in contact with a puppet, it sprouted up from the ground and wrapped it in its special icy blue light and then the lightning lines would proceed to move toward its next target. After a few seconds, all the puppets in a fifty meter diameter area dropped like bugs. Their body was charred black and smoking and the chakra thread were forced to disconnect.

"Sick jutsu, now let's move. I don't know how, but there are more coming." Maki said with amazement as he brought the earth wall down, and everyone nodded.

I was a fool to think that an at-least A-rank criminal would let us leave so easily. For a seasoned combatant like I was in my previous life, I developed a sense for bloodlust and killing intent that's very much like a sixth sense. I didn't feel it, when the first chakra strand came flying at us. I reacted at the last possible moment, using my lightning chakra enhanced blade to nullify it. But soon, ten more followed, and my teammates were just in time to turn around to position themselves for the following attack.

That's why it came as a surprise for them when none of the chakra thread hit them. Instead, whoever shot the chakra thread seemed drunk as all the threads missed my team by just an inch.

"What the...:" Yoshida muttered, unsure of what the enemy seemed to aim for. It was the last sentence I heard before something went wrong. I looked at where the chakra thread actually landed, sharingan still activated ever since the beginning. The thread was connected neatly to the fallen puppet parts. In fact it was so neat that each separated parts was connected by exactly one thread. The second thing that alerted me was the fact that I could see the amount of chakra was poured into the puppet parts, those chakra was circulating in a mess in the dead human flesh. _Shit_ , I realized, the dead body parts have no complete chakra system for the chakra to circulate since a) they were dead, and b) the body was cut up. When you let radioactive substance ran wild in a nuclear power plant, you get Chernobyl; when you let chakra energy ran wild in uncontrolled chakra system, you get something similar.

"Everybody get away, it's going to explode!" I yelled as loud as I can and grabbed the person closest to me, which was Takuma, and shot for the sky. We'd been stupid, we didn't know what a Suna puppet user could do with their puppets, and we let the perpetrator land a perfect ambush. I could only hope that Yoshida and Maki heard my warning and did the same. A simple earth wall was not gonna hold, seeing as the body-parts-turned-bombs were resting right by our feet, so our only option was to run. Run for the trees and get away, hoping that the blast was either unconcentrated (unlikely seeing how much chakra was poured in) or in a small range.

The explosion happened immediately right after I grabbed Takuma and took off. The sound was so loud that I thought I'd busted my eardrums, but that wasn't my main concern. It was the searing pain on my back that turned my brain into mush. The image in front of me seemed to flicker, there wasn't a forest anymore, there was the shattered glass from the building. I saw the city lights, the world I was born in yet never really lived. I gasped as I missed the branch and was knocked off balance. I tripped along with Takuma and we crashed into the ground.

I clearly felt the crisp crack of my rib breaking as I hit the dirt. I didn't get out immediately, instead I dragged Takuma closer and quickly did the simple hand seal for an basic Earth release: Earth Wall. I had to keep extra attention so that I wouldn't faint because of the pain. I hugged the ground and let the earth wall shield us until I felt no heat waves anymore. Takuma closed his eyes beside me and waited silently. His body was shaking as the remaining explosion and heat waves unfolded.

When I let the Earth Wall down and forced my body to crawl up, our previous position was now a giant crater. My body was aching, threatening to fall apart, which was not the first time it happened, but definitely not a good sign. Takuma was already up and moving, he seemed fine, a few burns on his body and a few bruises, but as least he didn't wince when he stood up.

"Let me take a look at your injuries." He said before covering his hands in the green medical chakra. Takuma was a strange one, he was nervous about the mission, yet he managed to keep calm whenever his medical ninjutsu was required. He ran his hand over my body before starting the healing on my rib.

"Second degree burn on a portion of your back, two cracked ribs that I'm healing right now, it's lucky that there's no damage to the lung. The other bruises and burns are superficial. Once I heal your ribs you should be able to move just fine, although you will have to bare the pain on your back. Can you see Yoshida-san and Maki-san with your sharingan?" He asked. I activated the sharingan with the just the minimal chakra needed. Most of my chakra was used to soften the impact and protect my body, not to forget the ninjutsu I used earlier. Fortunately Takuma was also replenishing my chakra in the process, I was able to activate sharingan without fear of chakra exhaustion. I searched around the surrounding, paying careful attention to any body shape or chakra signature. Gosh, I hoped that they all escaped from the explosion.

"There! I see them. Their chakra was still circulating, so they should be alive. But they aren't moving, you need to check on them quickly. If they are in a comatose, we would be in big trouble in enemy territory. We need to be moving and retreating quickly." I pointed Takuma to the direction. He was reluctant to leave me half healed, but eventually, he walked toward our two fallen teammates.

I sat up and checked my supply. My twin swords were still strapped onto my back, and even though my weapon bag was burned a bit, the contents seemed to be okay. I didn't have a messenger hawk or a summon, however, I did have something that allowed me to send message. I pulled out a small black scroll, sealed with the Kanji 神原 (Shinbara). Akira-shishou gave it to me a year ago, a scroll for emergency use, some kind of special transportation seal that allowed the message to be transported back to it's owner, and allow the owner to know the location of the scroll used.

" _Only use this when it's absolutely emergency. It's an expensive and limited edition."_ I remembered his words. Well, this counts for emergency, it's better to be scolded by Shishou than be dead. I opened the scroll and bit my finger. I used my blood to write on the scroll "A-rank Puppet User. Full ability unknown. Team suffered heavy injury. Require immediate backup. Maiko". After I finished the message I rolled it back and peeled off the seal. Immediately, the scroll disappeared in a poof. _This better not be a joke, Shishou, I really couldn't afford it right now._ Now the only problem was the attacker, the mastermind puppeteer. Why didn't he/she show up, right now we were at the most vulnerable stage, two are immobile, one was injured, and the other was not combat specialized.

I pushed the question to the back of my mind, for now, my teammates were most likely with heavy injuries, and I needed to get them moving, send a message to the nearest outpost and retreat as fast as we could, preferably before the enemy shows up with another army of human puppets that could explode even if cut up.

"How are they doing?" I asked quietly as I walked toward Takuma. Maki seemed conscious now, but Yoshida was still lying on the ground as Takuma continued to heal him.

"Maki-san's injury is manageable. He has two fractured ribs as well, and I already stabilized them so they won't puncture the lungs. He also has a broken arm and some second degree burns on his thigh. He's lucky that he can walk. Yoshida-san is a little more complicated. His suffered from liver laceration, and his right leg as well as his right arm is broken. He also suffered from third degree burn on his back. We have to get him to a clinic or he will die." Takuma said as calm he could, but I could see sweat gathering on his face.

"We need to send a message to the outpost, so they can send shinobi to escort us. In our condition, even if we could carry Yoshida-san, we would be slowed, and it'll be worse if the enemy came. I already sent a message to Konoha (hopefully), now we just need to move to a safe location." I said solemnly. Self-preservation was one thing, but there's no way I could abandon my fellow Konoha Shinobi, _or could I? No don't even think about it, this is not my previous life, and I don't work for OLYMPUS, sacrifices are not okay._

"Maki-san, do you think you could walk and maybe even carry Yoshida-san with Ito-san? No offense, but right now, I seemed to be the only combat-able shinobi right now, I would need to escort and protect you three if the enemy does come for us." I asked, not sure if he would listen to my command. But to my surprise, he didn't show any disapproval, instead, he just nodded.

"Of course, Uchiha-san. Yoshida-san tried to shield me from the blast when I was caught by surprise, so I will do everything you said, if it means we can save him." Maki said sincerely as he tried to stood up against the pain on his leg. Takuma was already writing the message to the outpost, and as soon as he sent it off with a hawk, he came over and carried Yoshida with Maki. We started to move at a slow pace toward the outpost. _Damn it, this mission was definitely messed up to the point of no return, now I couldn't imagine anything else that could… Actually, I remembered the worry I pushed to the back of my mind, the puppeteer, he or she had been inactive for five minutes as we regroup and move away. That might seem like a short time, but it's long enough for a shinobi battle to finish. So tell me, why? Didn't the puppeteer move? If he/she was gathering his remaining puppets (since most were charred and blew up), then five minutes would be the perfect time for him/her to attack…_

 _It's here._ The puppeteer was here.

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A/N: don't you just love cliffhangers? No okay, sorry...

Anyway, for those who wants to jump straight to canon events, I'm sorry, I really want to fill the blank with interesting stories, so I hope it's tolerable. Also, if you have any confusions with the events, feel free to message me or leave a question. I try to make things clear for the readers, but you know, there's foreshadowing, and then there are also things that I just want to be left to interpretations.

Thank you for reading! Leave a review if you feel like it!


	11. Chapter 11 - Post-Mortem

A/N: This must be the longest chapter I have written so far (over 7000 words^_^). Any way here is chapter 11, there are some warning in here. I don't write a lot of bloody and gore stuff, but this chapter contains some torture scene (There is no skin flaying, that can stay in game of throne), ex. beating, denailing. I tried to keep the blood at minimum, so I think if you read through the chapter before, this is not much different.

Also, on the notes of update schedule, I did say that I am going to update every Saturday, and I am glad that so far I am on schedule. After sticking to the schedule for ten chapters, I think I can confidently say that I should be able to stick to the schedule, at lease until January (since that is where my first round of very important exams are, but even then, I'll definitely put out a chapter before two weeks). That means, one chapter per week guaranteed for the next three months, and if my teachers feel especially lenient, they may even give me less homework that allow me to update two chapters some times. (they are not very lenient so far, but one can have hope).

Beta'd by the awe-inspiring Alice J ^_^

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Chapter 11 - Post-Mortem

 _It's here_. The puppeteer was here.

Instead of the human puppet army, I was surrounded by five puppets. Just five, but they gave off a more dangerous feeling than the mass swarm of puppets earlier. The five puppets were dressed in a strange manner, with mesh jackets and ninja sandals. They used to be ninjas, I realized, shinobi whose bodies were turned into puppets. _Which village?_ I recognize their fabric head cover as well as its distinct flak jacket from Sunagakure. They were Suna-nin, dead and turned into puppets. Please, please, I prayed that it's not Sasori of the Red Sand, hoping that maybe once, my luck would show on this mission.

I pulled out my blades slowly, Hyakki Yakō in my left hand and Senbonzakura in my right. The tension in the air was rising, my breath slowed to observe the five enemies in front of, and my teammates seemed to be frozen and have stopped breathing. With no warning, there was a maniacal laugh that broke my attention. I snapped my neck toward the sound, and I saw him, a man dressed in a white cape. His face seemed to be contorting in an unhealthy excitement, and his hand was covered in stitches. His ten fingers were connected to at least thirty chakra thread when normal puppeteers could only connect ten threads.

"Welcome, my guest, I'm surprised you managed to destroy that many of my puppet armies, but alas, that earned you the tickets for this special show, a show that none of you will want to leave!" He said in a hysterical voice before bursting into another fit of laughter. Calm down, I told myself, first I had to figure out who he is, at least he seemed dramatic and chatty.

"Who are you, Sasori of the Red Sand?" I asked and the man just laughed again. I couldn't tell if he was offended or glad, there seemed to be only craziness in his voice.

"Woah! I'm honored that you think I am Sasori-sama. He is such an inspirational figure to me, but no, I am not Sasori-sama. I am Chiashi, and one day I will be as famous as Sasori-sama in my puppet art!" He screamed fanatically. I let out a small breath, but I quickly redrew the breath, realizing that no matter who he was, we were still surrounded by enemies, one of us is critical condition, the other one heavily injured and another not suited for battle.

"Would you kindly let us go? We will spread your name just like you wanted." I said like an idiot, hell, at this point, I'm willing to try anything.

"Such a good girl, and it's a nice offer, but you just destroyed fifty of my precious army, I would feel so bad if I didn't use all of you to replenish my army." I thought so. Without any other exchange I launched toward the shinobi puppet closest to me.

I slashed at the shinobi's elbow, if he was really a puppet, then destroying his joint wouldn't do much good, except that maybe I could get rid of some of it's arsenal that's embedded in its arm. However, considering it's human once maybe I could work on that. from what I'd learnt, human puppets can use chakra and jutsu. However, I didn't know if the limitation of hand seal for ninjutsu was still there. If I took of an arm, then maybe I could limit their ninjutsu.

What I thought was nice, but unfortunately, the puppet moved too quickly, and my blade only manages to nick its arm. The lightning touched his elbow and spread to his forearm, soon, it's blackened lightly. It turned around and smacked towards my head. I bend my body slightly to avoid the strike, in the meantime, I thrust my tantō forward and pierced its' shoulder. With a slight twist and some lightning chakra, one of its' arm fell off. Immediately I gathered chakra in my chest, jumped backward and shot a Great Fireball towards the puppet. I land near my teammates, just in time to see the puppet moving away from the fireball, leaving its fallen arm to be incinerated.

The weakness of his human puppets were their weak bodies; compared to some well made puppets, human flesh was far too weak. However, they can use chakra, and perform ninjutsu, adding to the fact that they could move perfectly after losing a limb and there's hidden traps in them, they are deadly glass cannons. But, if I can figure out their weakness in the short exchange we had, then I have no doubt Chiashi knows this from the start.

The other four puppets moved just as I land beside my teammates. They didn't move forward, instead, they started to form hand seals. One of them immediately shot a dozen fire bullets toward us. Immediately I put back my swords, and started to form the hand seal for a water ninjutsu I copied from Kakashi. Three pillar of water shot out of my hands, they were small, but just enough to hit all the fireballs. The water distinguished the flames, but quickly, I cursed as I saw the shurikens that hid behind the fireball and traveled past the water pillar.

Before I could move, a earth wall was up in front of me, and as soon as it was up, I could hear the sound of shuriken raining down on it. I turned around and saw Maki with his hand on the ground, I nodded at him quickly and he nodded back.

I didn't get a time to rest before a wave of wind blades crashed towards us. I blocked one of them with my tantō, but the wind blade still pushed me back before it disperse. I could dodge, I thought, but then my teammates would be left undefended. Maki is desperately trying to put up earth walls around him, but his back along with Takuma and Yoshida would be undefended. Damn it, it's so much easier when you could dodge. Instead I stood my ground and started to block the wind blades.

The wind jutsu was so much more powerful than the fire, even with two swords and sharingan, there's no point if I could only see it but unable to block it. I deflected one of them away from my neck, and let the other one scrape across my thigh. Lightning was weak against the wind, but fire would probably burn myself and my teammates with it, so unfortunately, I was stuck with lightning. Another wind blade whizzed toward my chest, I hurriedly moved my sword to block it. The impact pushed my sword back and crashed into my chest. There was a distinct feeling of pain that told me the ribs Takuma healed for me a while ago had just been broken again. I gasped and one of the wind blade scratched against my stomach, leaving a bloody trail on the side of my belly.

Then the stones came out of nowhere. One minute I was standing fine, albeit having trouble with the wind blades, the next there were stone spikes coming out of the ground. I rolled away my body in shock when one of the spike rose under me, threatening to impale me. Suddenly, there was a scream, and then there were gurgling sounds. In that split second, I saw Maki getting impaled by one of the spike, and Takuma screamed. I was distracted for a second, realizing that there's no way Maki could have lived after that, and I missed a spike that rose beside me.

I felt the searing pain as my right leg was pierced by the stone spike. It's going numb, and I couldn't move. It hurt, it was like something burned away my leg and it was gone, gone, gone. Maki was left hanging on the spike, Takuma was trembling in fear, Yoshida was left on the ground and nobody could protect him from being pierced by a stone spike. We were all going to die.

"Hahaha, good try, but unfortunately, all the performers in this show are Jonin veterans, or 'were', depending on your perception. But you, little girl, have something interesting. Sharingan! A Kekkei Genkai! Absolutely lovely!" Chiashi laughed as he said in a high pitched voice. I tried to pull my leg off of the stone spike, but the pain from moving threatened to make me lose consciousness. Takuma was still alive, but if I died, then he will surely die.

Every cell in my body screamed for me to leave immediately. I needed to survive, I was finally able to live, and self-preservation was the goal. So why the hell was I still here? I guess I couldn't leave Takuma behind, Konoha's teaching would really be the death of me. The mission was busted anyway, two of my teammates dead, and would probably be turned into puppets. There was really no decision between mission or comrade, because the mission was screwed, so what's there to lose? Right, my life.

"Leave, Takuma, leave. You are the only one who could get away now." I said to the teenager beside me in a raspy voice.

"But, I can't just leave you! You are hurt and you can't fight in a state like this!" He said in a panic.

"But you are a distraction! I can't stay alive while trying to watch out for you!" I screamed, suddenly aware of Chiashi watching our drama in a mild interest. He must be really confident that none of us would survive.

"Leave! Or I will use sharingan on you! So would you rather leave now, report the situation, get back up and leave me to fight undistracted, or stubbornly stay and make me waste my precious chakra on you!" I yelled at him, there were tears streaming down my eyes, and I wasn't sure if they were caused by the pain or the annoyance I was feeling right now.

He seemed stunned for a second, then he closed his eyes, clenched his fist and finally nodded. _Good, get away Takuma, hell if I know why I choose to sacrifice for you._

"Good try, but none of you are getting away, if you think you can run from my soldiers, then you are really wrong." Chiashi chimed in, then he moved his hands and all five puppets surrounded us.

"We will see about that." I whispered, unsure what I was suppose to do. I placed my hands together, started to form the hand seals. I needed to attract all the puppet's attention, how? Attack Chiashi directly. I needed to be a strong attack that would require all five of them to protect Chiashi, or it needed to be multiple strikes that requires multiple puppets to defend from all directions.

"Raiton: Rairyu no Mai!" I yelled, pouring all my chakra into this one strike. I didn't need to control it, I just needed the damage to the max. I pushed out my palms, letting six lightning dragons shoot out of it. I aimed directly for Chiashi with no extra control, Kakashi would be horrified to see me do this, but my plan was to let it strike and burn.

As I expected, Chiashi's face was filled with shock as he pulled all his puppets back to defend his body. The lightning dragons twisted in the air and aimed at him with amazing speed, and I wasn't even controlling it, I was just letting these massive strikes of lightning run wild.

As the forest was lit up by the ninjutsu, I felt the heaviness of my body down. Nausea and loss of consciousness followed, typical for chakra depletion and severe loss of blood. Takuma was gone the moment I started my jutsu, and it looked like Chiashi would be occupied with the jutsu for a moment longer. I closed my eyes, happily yelling at myself for being the heroic idiot, and let the darkness sweep me away…

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

Lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub.

That was the first sign telling me that I was indeed, still alive. I groaned and winced as I pushed my body off of the cold hard floor. My head was heavy, and I felt nauseous and confused. I needed to stand up and leave, lying down was a dangerous position. But I couldn't feel my right leg; it's not painful, it's just numbed.

I looked down on my leg, my pants were soaked in dry blood, telling me that my leg was indeed pierced in the earlier fight, but the wound seemed to have stopped bleeding. I slowly ran my hand down my thigh, there were… stitches. Someone treated my bleeding, although it wasn't a very good job. The stitches were crooked, and my whole leg felt heavy and slow.

 _Where am I?_ I thought with a sharp fear, I was inside a cell, and outside of it… puppets, human puppets everywhere. It's Chiashi, he took me prisoner, and he even gave me emergency medical treatment, _but why? Why am I still alive? What does he need me for?_

"Awake, little girl? Did you have a good dream or a nightmare? Please say it's a nightmare, they are the best." I heard Chiashi's disgusting voice echoing around the cell.

"Why the hell am I here." I snapped back, his voice was giving me a headache on top of my drowsy brain.

"Good question, I see you are appreciating my beautiful artwork. Let me show you something better." Chiashi moved his stitched hands and shot out some chakra thread. Two figure walked stiffly out of the mass puppet army. I was stunned when I saw them, and then I had to cover my mouth to push down the wave of nausea.

Yoshida and Maki stood beside Chiashi, or rather, their bodies.

"Beautiful isn't it! They aren't my best work, you see the hole in the chest is really an eyesore, but it gave me some ideas for hidden weapons. After all, they are just chunin, their potential is lacking." he commented nonchalantly. I clenched my fists to keep it from shaking in rage. _How dare he, mutilating the bodies of the dead, how dare he!_

"But you will be different, sharingan, kekkei genkai, and those ninjutsu skills. You will be a perfect addition." He said.

"Then why didn't you kill me then, why did you bother to take me prisoner." I yelled at him, completely forgetting to control my rage.

"You are special, little girl, and your transformation would require… some extra preparations. And once that's complete, I will rival Sasori-sama in terms of my human puppet skill. You will be my first kekkei genkai puppet, my first trophy!" Chiashi waved his arms frantically, but I just grinned.

"You don't know how do you? You have never succeeded in turning a kekkei genkai user into puppets, and you don't know how. You are just a copycat of Sasori of the Red Sand, but you don't even have the skills to copy him. How pathetic." I spat at him with sarcasm and I laughed as his eyes glinted in anger.

Suddenly the puppet Maki appears inside of my cell, how, I don't know. Before I could do anything, its hand clasped around my neck and pulled me off of the ground. I struggled to get his hand off, clawing and scratching, trying to breathe in oxygen.

"How dare you say that! You insolent girl!" Chiashi screeched, I guessed I succeeded in making my point. "Doesn't matter, soon, I will definitely perfect the skill for kekkei genkai users. In the meantime, there are other ways I could make you my puppet. You are naive if you think I can't do anything to you just because I need your body as a puppet." As if proving his point, the puppet punched me in the gut and threw me toward the wall. I gasped in pain as the air was knocked out of my chest, and my hand shook as they attempt to support my body.

"I will make your life so miserable that you will lose yourself. I will make your mind a puppet first before I make your body one. I used to be a doctor, but people kept on dying on me. Until one day I saw Sasori-sama reviving the dead through the art of puppet, and I realized that this is my true calling. So do not underestimate me girl, I know the exact method of making you miserable while still keeping you alive." He said to me venomously.

I raised my eyes and stared at him, I wasn't afraid, maybe I should be. It's been so long since I've been truly afraid, maybe that made me reckless and bold. Chiashi controlled the puppet to haul me up and hung me up by my wrists. Something cold was clasped around my hands, and with a sinking heart, I realized that it's chakra-restraining hand cuffs.

"I'm sure you know about pressure points for chakra, but there are pressure points designed to inflict great pain. Fascinating how such a small point could produce so much pain, enough for you to forget everything." He said as he walked slowly towards me. He walked past me and stood behind me. I couldn't see clearly, but I thought I saw a flash of senbon, then, all the pain erupted.

It wasn't like being punched or kicked, no, the pain is sharper, more concentrated. It feels like thousands of needle had burst from the little point on my back and pierced through my body, my veins, my heart, my nerves.

I remembered hearing a scream, but I didn't remember screaming.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

 _When I was around ten (It could be nine or eleven, I wasn't sure), I was sent out on a mission. The mission was to retrieve a target from the enemy base and interrogate the target for information. What I didn't know was that 'retrieve' meant abduction, the 'target' was the young daughter of a Russian Mafia Boss, the 'enemy base' was her father's mansion, and 'interrogate' meant torture until she spilled._

 _I followed my superior 'Heracles', along with three of my fellow operatives, too inexperienced to be given a codename other than numbers. We infiltrated the housing when the Russian Mafia boss was not home, killing ten bodyguards in the process. Finally, we abducted the fourteen year old girl in her own room. She was crying for her father in Russian, and our superior 'Heracles' banged her head on the table to make her stop. I swear I saw a streak of red running on her forehead, but I kept my mouth shut. It wasn't my place, and it was an effective way of completing the mission._

 _I forgot for a moment that there was a second part of the mission. At that time, all the missions I'd been on consist of infiltration and assassination. The interrogation was a novelty for me, and I presumed that's the lesson of the mission. OLYMPUS liked hands-on training, and we never practiced on dummies._

' _Heracles' dumped the girl onto one of the rusty chair in the safehouse and tied her onto the chair tightly. He said to the rookie operatives "Watch and learn, recruits, it's your lesson on interrogation. In OLYMPUS, we employ both psychological and physical torture. We do whatever is needed to get the information from the target." then he dumped a bucket of water on the young girl, forcing her to be conscious._

 _The girl first gasped in shock, before she started to mumble words in Russian, praying for help that would never come. 'Heracles' was quick to shut her up by slapping her hard on the cheek. The girl gagged in pain and proceeded to whimper._

" _Tell us what we need to know, girl, and you won't be experiencing pain." 'Heracles' said in a menacing tone. He didn't say that we will let her go because all of us in OLYMPUS knew that she would never breathe again after we got the information._

" _When does your father plan to send out that shipment of firearms? Or did you overhear him mentioning any voyage or shipments." 'Heracles' asked in Russian, articulating each word carefully._

" _I don't know! I don't know! Father never tells me anything!" the girl was screaming. What was her name, Natalia? Tatiana? It was somewhere in the mission debrief. It didn't matter now, nobody cared._

' _Heracles' punched her in the stomach, and none of us showed any expression as the girl cried in pain. We ignored the cracking sound originating from her chest, one of her ribs had been broken, and it would hurt like hell._

" _Please! I don't know anything! Please, just let me go." The girl whimpered with tears, stuttering to get the words out, but that just earned her another punch. 'Heracles' grabbed her blond hair and jerked her head back in a swift motion._

" _Speak up, girl, we know your father conducts most of his business at home. His lips aren't even that tight with his mistresses, and you expect us to believe he never let it slip around you. Don't test my patience." He spat in her face. Psychological tactics, I thought. He was getting into her personal space, telling her that we knew her every secret, telling her that there was no way to hide. I suddenly realized, 'Heracles' was making a demonstration: a teaching demonstration for us, the new operatives. He was making this girl the practice dummy._

" _I really don't know, I don't know anything! I'm just a stupid little girl, dad never told…" Before she should finish her sentence, 'Heracles' clasped his hand around her throat and choking her until her neck was purple. The pain by suffocation, not only a method of physical torture, but the psychological trauma was major as well. The girl went unconscious for a moment from the pain before she was suffocated to death. 'Heracles' didn't wake her up immediately this time, instead he walked towards us._

" _Operative 31, it's your turn. Do you best." He said to me in a monotone voice. 'We will be evaluating you, so don't fail' that was the real meaning behind the line. I walked towards the unconscious girl, bringing a bucket of water as I approached her._

 _I dumped the water on her, watching her awake from the icy coldness. I could tell her muscle relaxed when she saw me. She couldn't see my face, but she could see my small stature, she must have thought that I couldn't be any worse than the big man earlier. Wrong. If I fail this, I die, simple as that. OLYMPUS doesn't need useless agents. So I shoved my sentimental feelings into the pit, along with the many other lives I've taken. I didn't want to do this to her, she seemed so young and innocent, and she was only here because of her father. I didn't want to do this, but I didn't have a choice. Liar, I did, but I simply chose my own survival against her sanity._

 _I didn't say a word to her, instead, I walked behind her and latched my hands on to her shoulder. Within a fraction of a second, I dislocated her shoulder in the most forced and brutal manner. She howled in pain, but I forced my hands to stay iron still and not tremble because of the horrific deed I'd done._

" _Tell me the location and time. Or your other shoulder goes." I said ruthlessly, using my best facade. The girl wailed but she didn't say anything, so I latched my hands on her other shoulder and twisted. She wailed louder, crying and pleading._

" _There are 206 bones in your body and many more joints, I can do this all day. The question is, can you?" I said again in that cold voice. When she went silent, I moved my hands towards her knees._

" _It's three days from now! The shipment is three days from now! Father said it over the phone, something is going out three days from now at midnight!" The girl said in a broken and muffled voice. I didn't even catch myself relaxing my heartbeat a bit. Thank god I didn't have to continue, thank god she said something._

" _Enough." 'Heracles' said to me as he motioned another operative to go take the charge. They were going to keep going, I realized. Why? Hadn't she said enough, she spilled everything! Not quite, a voice in the back of my head said, she didn't tell me the location. I suddenly understood that no matter if she knew anymore or not, the rounds won't be finished until every new operatives here had completed the interrogation evaluation. Her torture was our teaching material._

" _Good try." our superior whispered to me as I walked back, still keeping his eyes on Operative 16, who was 'interrogating' right now. "Good use of physical and psychological tactics. However, to maximize the pain, the dislocating motion could have been performed more slowly, and your voice could have contained more anger to give her a sense of urgency." I could only bow my head at his comment. His voice was calm and cold, he wasn't a sadist. Sadists were considered emotionally unstable for the organization, so the agents were trained to maximize the efficiency in missions, but not actually liking them. It was the ultimate goal in killing emotions._

 _The interrogation evaluation lasted for another hour, the girl managed to spill the location, and even the number of armed force at that transaction as well. It was clear by the end of the session that she wasn't really an innocent little daddy's girl, she knew way too much for that. But her cries of pains and whimpers were still chilling me to the bones, almost making me unable to bear it._

 _By the time she spilled everything, she had two more dislocated kneecaps, a few more broken bones, four missing fingernails, and patches of bruising covering her whole body. Her eyes looked blank, there weren't really anything in it, no defiance, no desperation, no anger, and no pleading. She was simply gone, broken like one of those Russian ballerina dolls._

 _I never saw her again, nor have I heard about this mission anymore._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

I twitched my body frantically for god knows how many times already, trying everything to ease the exploding pain in my body. It wasn't working, the pain wasn't fading. Usually after so many shocks to the pain, the body would shut down to block the pain, but whatever method Chiashi used, the pain kept on repeating with no signs of decreasing. If anything, it increased.

 _Karma, retribution_ , I thought as I screamed again, unable to hold back my voice. This time, I was the broken Russian doll. I deserved it, because of everything I had done, this was my payback, before I would become a human puppet with no will. _A broken ballerina doll._

The senbon stabbed me again, and I screamed again as the pain erupted. _It hurts! Every tendon in my body was being shattered, and every nerve I could feel is burning_.

I wanted to let go, let go of the pain, let go of the world. Chiashi's maniac laughter was still resonating in my ears, I had no idea that I still had the cognitive ability to hear him. He was crazy, he was a sadist and I was going to be killed by him.

Why didn't that girl - Anya was her name, I suddenly remembered - give up the first time. Yes, she would have still died, but maybe, she would have suffered less, our superior would have chosen another target for our practice lesson. Instead, I clearly remembered that she kept the last bit of information secret until the last second. Was it loyalty? Was it bravery?

" _My papa will come and get me!"_

She said that numerous time, she yelled it and she whispered it. I wanted to tell her that he won't, he would never find out where OLYMPUS was, where we took her. _Was it faith then?_

 _I have a chance!_ I had to believe that I had a chance. _I wanted to live!_ Akira-sensei would get my message and I trusted him. Chiashi won't kill me before his preparation was due, although he could inflict extreme pain, he wouldn't kill me. He wouldn't kill me. HE COULDN'T KILL ME.

 _Think, Maiko, think, what can I do to fool him, what can I do to live longer_. He wanted me to break psychologically, compared to that Russian girl, he didn't want me to spill anything. _Then all I need to do is give him a show._

"Shut up! Shut up! I won't do what you want!" I yelled using the most frantic voice I could. All the prisoners I had met started with denial and anger, then they slumped to desperation before they were finally broken. The road from Konoha was three days max, I just needed to hold on.

"You say that now, but you will be broken anyway." Chiashi chimed behind me. I almost wanted to laugh as he stabbed me again. This time, I didn't hold back my scream. If Chiashi wanted a show, I would give him one. After all, in my previous life, I was a pretender. Now I just needed to hold onto my sanity.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

 _When I was thirteen, I was kidnapped. I was captured on a mission along with two more rookie operatives. They took me to a cabin and started to beat us to death._

 _It was not planned at all, nobody should know we were even on the mission, secrecy and ruthlessness was OLYMPUS' creed. Still, they found us. After the initial beat down, they took us to separate rooms. Torture by isolation, I thought, a psychological tactic, they wanted something from us._

" _Tell me about your organization! Tell me everything." The man in mask yelled at me. Anger, used to scare and agitate the prisoner, gave them a sense of urgency._

" _I don't know what you are talking about. I don't have an organization." I said coldly. OLYMPUS taught us to never betray the organization, and I had no doubt they would hunt down whoever defected._

" _Shut the crap up. We know everything, we know you have a bigger organization behind you!" the masked man punched me in the stomach, making me gag and gasp for air. He wasn't finished, he kicked me onto the ground, and I couldn't help but let the whimpers through my mouth. It was so painful, so painful. It felt like my stomach was shredding to pieces._

" _Let's try again. What is your organization called?" He asked again, staring into my eyes with rageful eyes. I didn't know what he was looking for in my eyes, there's no defiance, no fear, no emotion._

" _Nothing, there is nothing." I said to him, annunciating each word clearly. What happened next pretty much repeated itself. Physical torture and psychological torture, although they weren't very good at it. Compared to what OLYMPUS has taught us to do, they weren't even trying._

 _Nevertheless, I turned my eyes blank. I blocked out the searing pain, blocked out their words and blocked out the potential screaming sounds from the next room…_

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

I was strapped to a table, hands bound to the cold surface with the chakra restraining hand cuffs. Once Chiashi was bored with the pain pressure points, he proceeded to play with my fingernails. He said to me "I still need your finger to hold a sword, but your fingernails won't be required."

So I was missing two of my fingernails on my left hand. They had been bleeding profusely a moment ago, but I wasn't sure what happened now. Chiashi stabbed my stomach and let out some blood earlier, so the blood loss kept me dizzy.

I was planning on moving onto the second stage, the desperation stage. I slumped my head on the table, pitifully averting my eyes from the red fingers. 'It was a form of sensory stimuli, the red made it seemed more painful than it actually is.' Even I don't believe that crap anymore because the pain was excruciating even when I blacked out.

'Keep up with the faith' I kept telling myself. How long had it been, one day? Two days maybe, considering the fact that I had passed out a few times.

"I like that look in your eyes, it says you've lost all hope." Chiashi said as he crept in front of my eyes. I closed my eyes on reflex.

"A little bit more until you are gone, and then you will be a puppet forever until I can turn you into an actual puppet, and it would save me a lot of trouble when you are not resisting. So let's start on another one." He murmured with hysteria.

Before I could brace myself, one of his puppets punched a needle in between my flesh and my fingernail. Then it ripped.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

 _The masked man left me tied up in a chair after I ignored him. My body felt paralyzed from all the pain and I didn't want to move at all since some of my bones were broken._

 _They left me alone in the dark, tiny room for god knows how long. Sensory deprivation, isolation, starvation, all standard torture tactics._

 _I snapped my eyes open when I heard the sound of someone screaming getting closer and closer to the room. The door opened, revealing two masked men carrying another teenager. They entered the door and the teenager, operative 44, was kicking furiously._

" _What do you want from me, I told you everything!" Operative 44 yelled at the man. I closed my eyes, refusing to believe that he had spilled. Now he would die and I would probably die along with him. Stupid. Child._

" _I don't trust you. If your teammate tells us the same, then we will let you live." The masked man directed the attention at me. NO, I was never going to betray the organization, not because of how loyal I was, but because I knew what they were capable of when dealing with traitors._

 _Operative 44 was looking at me with hope, but I closed my eyes and refused to say anything._

" _Tell us everything, or he dies!" The masked man held out a gun and pointed at my fellow operative's head. He was yelling at me, they were all yelling at me. But I refused to do anything._

 _There was a bang, and operative 44 received a hole in his head. He fell down staring at me. Staring. At. Me._

" _Now his death is on you." Yes, his death was on me._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

He finally took the chakra-restraining handcuffs off of me. He let me slump onto the cell floor, breathing lightly but consistently. My left hand was covered in blood, some dried, some still running. Chiashi finally decided I was done, I was gone. Either I was a good actress, or I was really gone. I'd like to think that I wasn't blank anymore, I could still think, still contemplate about what I was going to do.

It's been three days, with no sign of anyone coming. I was too tired to feel mad about leaving my future in someone else's hands. But I didn't have a choice, Chiashi's body might be weak, seeing he never did anything that required strength himself, only ever using the puppets. I thought he might have done something surgically to allow him the higher capacity for chakra threads, but it wrecks his body. Still, I was injured, starved and dehydrated. If Chiashi wasn't determined to keep me alive, I would be dead already.

I heard something, something mobilizing, either Chiashi was raiding another village, or he was getting ready to. To my surprise, one of his shinobi puppets, a former Suna-nin, came and got me. Chiashi controlled him to hold me by one hand, the one where my nails were still intact, and let the other hand slump beside me. He must be really confident that the pain would keep me from doing anything.

He dragged me out, and for the first time in god knows how long, I saw the piercing light and I closed my eyes while shrieking. Chashi laughed at my display, at this point, he probably believed me that I was broken from the pain, but he never knew what I had been through. I was never whole to begin with.

"Hahaha, losers, watch! Now your fellow Konoha-nins are also in my clutch, enjoy the fabulous artwork they make!" Chiashi was saying something to someone outside. I caught the word 'Konoha', but I refused to let my body twitch. Chiashi would have felt it, and all my careful works would be gone.

He brought the now-puppet-Maki and Yoshida up in front of him, I couldn't see from this angle who was cornering Chiashi, but I knew how sick it was to watch your own comrade being mutilated even after death. Chiashi, he was sadistic.

"Now I present you my master work, or soon to be master work. Doesn't matter, her mind is gone already, she is already a shell even before I make her into one!" The Suna-nin puppet brought me up by dragging me with one hand. I could finally plant my feet on the ground and stand. It was still weak, Chiashi was determined to do the bloodletting every few hours to keep me dizzy. But after a while, you get used to working with the dizziness. Chiashi took the chakra restraining handcuff a few hours before, and from them, my chakra was gathering naturally, too small to be abnormal, but big enough for something.

Something grabbed my hair and jerked my head back. Suddenly, I could see the fuzzy outline of the Konoha pursue-team. They were the black Anbu team, five of them probably, and they were surrounded by floods of puppet army. I had no idea how Chiashi gathered all those corpses without anyone noticing.

Anbu, their objective was to probably eliminate the enemy, working under the assumption that there was no hostage worth saving. But then I heard a yell, "Uchiha-kun!", my eyes followed the sound slowly, and I saw the medic-nin I saved, eyeing me worriedly.

Was he afraid that I was really broken, maybe, and he wouldn't be too far from the truth.

"Hahaha, that doesn't work, little boy, she doesn't even remember her own allegiance, let alone her name. Say, my puppet, what's your name?" Chiashi asked me in a sweet manner that almost made me cringe in disgust.

Sadistic, he was.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

" _Good work, operative. You pass the test. You didn't spill and you held your own against a torturer." 'Hecate' was his or her name, since he/she looked mostly androgynous, and his/her voice was a combination of both male and female, high and low at the same time._

 _I slumped against the chair, but this time, my hands were untied. I was just too tired to get up from the chair._

" _And I see you've accomplished something more." 'Hecate' eyed the fallen body next to the chair. The masked man was lying in a pool of blood, with a hole through his neck. Beside him, one of the chair legs was stained red._

" _I see that you've understood that there's unlimited ways of killing your enemy, you just have to find a way. OLYMPUS has been pleased by your performance, and it has been decided that you have the potential to be a great asset." he/she said calmly, not at all disturbed by the OLYMPUS agent dead beside my chair. It was only suppose to be a test to ensure our loyalty even under torturing. But I killed my interrogator, my examiner._

" _From this moment onward. You are 'Artemis'. Hold your given title in pride, operative. You have just been discovered." he/said chimed, pounding the words into my slightly blanked out brain._

' _Artemis'. That's who I was. That's who I would always be._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

"Hahaha, You think merely five of you could take on my whole army! Even if you add another squad, like the one you have hidden in the woods, you are still going to lose and my name will be carried on!" Chiashi was sadistic, but sadistic was insanity, and insanity meant people miss things. This was why OLYMPUS deemed any sorts of philia and phobia an emotional liability. They made mistakes, and they lose.

The Anbu and Chiashi's puppet army were in a standoff right now. Their best course of action was to ignore me and eliminate Chiashi before he could mobilize the whole army. The best option, where I would become the sacrifice. _Fuck it. I don't want to die._

"Artemis", I murmured in an inaudible voice, Chiashi was too busy laughing to hear it anyway. He was also too busy laughing to notice the change in my chakra flow.

The puppet held me in front of Chiashi with one iron grip on my right arm. Chiashi was confident that I wouldn't be able to do anything. In any case, it's true that my right arm was restrained, so I couldn't turn around to face Chiashi even if I wanted. _Wrong, there were unlimited ways of killing the enemy, some were harder than others._

I turned as the final bit of chakra gathered in my left hand. I used every last bit of strength I had. I turned around without hesitation as the puppet still held onto my right arm. My right shoulder popped as Chiashi stunned. I pushed my left hand, surrounded by raw lightning chakra, uncontrolled and unsuppressed, into his chest cavity.

My hands were burning from the uncontrollable lightning, but that's nothing compared to the pain from the denailing. Like I suspected, his flesh and bones were weak and soft, he probably did something really unnatural to allow his hands to have greater chakra control and mobility.

I felt his heart crushed by my hands in his chest cavity. How? I was not sure, it's just a natural instinct telling me that I killed someone. My instinct must have been right because the puppet holding my dislocated arm went limp like a twig, and suddenly nothing was keeping my body straight.

"My name is Uchiha Maiko. I am a Kunoichi of Konohagakure no Sato." I said to Chiashi as his lifeless body slipped out of my arm. Then, I fell down and lost consciousness.

 _There are unlimited ways of killing the enemy, I just have to find one. Because if I kill my enemy, it won't matter if I win or not, since my enemy definitely loses._

* * *

A/N: So that's done... yeah... so there you go, some snippets of her previous memories... I got nothing more to say today.

There is a reason the angst tag is on this story, but there are more relaxed and lighthearted chapters in the story. So please, leave a comment or review if you feel like it!


	12. Chapter 12 - I am Not Crazy

A/N: hey guys, chapter 12 is here as promised! So compare to the last chapter, this one is lighter, much lighter. My beta said that I couldn't write a single chapter without putting negative emotions in it, which is probably true. So this is like an experimental chapter where surprisingly, nobody died or got severely injured. So I hope you enjoy the happier mood in contrast to the previous few chapters.

For those guest reviewers (Guest, Guest1437, Gadget Boy), thank you so much for all your long detailed reviews! I really appreciate them! Even if I can't respond to you all privately, I hear you all loud and clear!

Beta's by [insert some adjective that is the synonym of awesome] Alice J. ^_^

* * *

Chapter 12 - I Am _Not_ Crazy

"Team Ro, reporting for the mission" Sandaime Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, found his elite Anbu team arriving at his office, five days after they were sent on an emergency A-rank mission.

"Speak to me, Hound." Hokage ordered from behind his office desk. It was too late at night for the mystery and he was tired of running the office. He might be called "the God" in the shinobi world, but he was still an old man who only wanted a peaceful retirement.

"Operation: Puppeteer. Objective one, eliminating the A-rank puppet user near the Konoha outskirt and his puppet army. Accomplished. Objective two, recover the captured Konoha Chunin or Chunins. Accomplished. We recovered one survivor of the team sent for the mission and brought her back for treatment." Hound summarized. This was definitely an A-rank mission, only due to the lack of information would the mission be wrongly classified as B-rank, thus resulting in the loss of two senior Chunin.

"Describe the mission in detail." He ordered. His Jōnin Commander, Nara Shikaku, stood by his side and listened as well.

"Team Ro was sent out five days ago, under the issue of an Emergency A-rank mission. We arrived at the Outpost near the village in two days. Then we found one survivor of the team originally sent out to deal with the problem, Medical Chunin Ito Takuma. He described the enemy, who called himself Chiashi, as a puppeteer imitating Sasori of the Red Sand, having the force of at least fifty human puppets and five high-rank Shinobi puppet. He claimed that two of his teammates, Chunin Yoshida Kazuo and Chunin Maki Kichirou were killed in action, and his other teammate, Chunin Uchiha Maiko sacrificed herself to be captured to ensure his survival. We then spent a day tracking down the puppeteer, along with a temporary tracking force assembled from the outpost including Ito Takuma." Hound reported the mission in detail. Hokage's heart chilled at the prospect of another human puppeteer. How could he not have received any reports of missing human prior to this, or any warning from Suna, warning the neighbouring country of the potential danger.

"We confronted the enemy outside of a cave that served as his hiding place. We were in a stalemate with his human puppeteer forces until Chiashi brought out the two dead Konoha Chunins as his puppets." Shikaku looked sick at the mention of this, and the Hokage agree wholeheartedly.

"Chiashi also brought out the prisoner Chunin Uchiha Maiko, who is still alive at that time, in an attempt to raise emotional turmoil. However, Uchiha Maiko, unresponsive at first, killed Chiashi at the last moment before the battle ensued, thus disabling all the enemy puppets." Hokage raised his eyebrows and his advisor Shikaku widened his eyes. They obviously weren't expecting such a turn of events.

"After we checked for any remaining dangers, we brought the bodies of the two KIA Konoha chunins back and Ito Takuma treated Uchiha Maiko on the way back, who was unconscious and unresponsive the whole way." the Hound finished reporting, and for the starter, Hokage was very glad that he listened to the emergency SOS signal Jonin Shinbara brought. Otherwise, Konoha would have lost another talented shinobi.

"What happened to the human puppets left?" Shikaku asked.

"They were cleaned and brought back to the Research and Development Division for further analysis. Commander Nara" The Hound answered. Sarutobi sighed, he wasn't sure what he would do with those. He would imagine that at least half of those human puppets were from the outskirt village, but how was he suppose to return the bodies now in this shape, let alone the political storm that's going to hit, from their possession of five Suna Jōnins' bodies.

Before he could quench his headache and say any wise-sounding words, he heard a knock on the door. "Come in" he answered and the door opened to reveal a man with long blond hair tied in a high ponytail.

"Ah, Inoichi-san, what do you have for me?" Hokage asked, wondering how much more bad news he was going to get tonight

"It's about the rescued prisoner, Hokage-sama." Inoichi answered, holding a file in his hand which he gave to Shikaku.

"Yes, Maiko-chan, how is she?" Hokage asked with concern.

"She is...battered, but she is out of critical conditions now." Inoichi said slowly, obviously noticing the team of Anbu in the office. Sarutobi quickly realized, he knew every Anbu agent, it's part of the job, and he definitely remembered a certain Uchiha prodigy he placed on Team Ro two years ago.

"Team Ro, you are all dismissed. Thank you for your good work, and you all get the next day off. Go do what you want, or go visit some people." he ordered not so subtly. But that hardly mattered as Team Ro disappeared in flashes.

"Please, continue, Inoichi-san." Sarutobi signalled the head of Intelligence Division to continue.

"I just visited her in the hospital ward. She was still unconscious under the sedative, and I did a mind scan to find out what happened on the mission. I fear that doing this when she was awake could result in more trauma… considering what she went through." Inoichi explained.

"And what did she go through?" the Hokage asked dangerously. What a sick thing to do to children, but alas, this was not the most peaceful time.

"It seemed that she went through three days of torture designed to instigate extreme pain, including repeated stabbing to pain pressure points, denailing, and some others. From her memories and thoughts, she seemed to understand the goal of her capture was not to kill her or ask for information but to break her mind psychologically. So compared to physical damage, I'm more worried about psychological trauma, and I would recommend her having therapy sessions with me." Inoichi continued and Sarutobi's brows frowned, his face was covered in anger. This was his people, this was one of his shinobi force.

"Do what you suggested Inoichi-san. What else did you recover from her memory about the mission." the Hokage questioned.

"It was just like what Ito-kun had described, the team followed standard instructions, found out about the enemy hideout and decided to ask for help, fearing the enemy to be at least A-rank. However, before they could do that they were ambushed twice, resulting in Yoshida-san and Maki-san's death and Uchiha-kun's capture. During her time being imprisoned, she had a lot of blackouts, some of which are very deep that I couldn't get anything from, so what Chiashi was doing during that period was unknown. However, strangely, Uchiha-kun was very resilient during her time, she seemed to be consciously analyzing the situation despite the pains she endured and decided that she would put on an act and wait for help. Although what concerned me, is that at the end, she seemed to show distaste to the possibility that Anbu will sacrifice her in order to eliminate the enemy, and I believe that's why she acted recklessly and killed Chiashi despite the better option of waiting." Inoichi finished, at the same time, Shikaku seemed to also finish the written version of the report and now both of them were looking at the Hokage for some kind of sign.

"Reasonable, I would be surprised if she didn't feel any negative emotions. What a strong girl. Give her a psych evaluation after she wakes up and help her to the best of your abilities in the therapy sessions, I don't want such a young talent to be crippled." he sighed, and Inoichi respectfully left the room.

"What do we do now, Shikaku, and what happened to the body of this 'Chiashi'?" Hokage asked his advisor. He felt too old to be doing this, but hey, that's why Shikaku was here.

"The body was recovered, although that little girl did quite a damage to it. She pierced through the heart with lightning chakra, it's almost unrecognizable. But now, Hokage-sama, we need to worry about the diplomatic relation with Sunagakure." Shikaku summarized, and Sarutobi brought his hands to his forehead. Sunagakure again, dealing with them was a pain in the ass, and now, this happened. Granted, their relation had never been that great, but this would definitely make it worse.

"Fine, contact the Suna, we need to take initiative. It's their missing-nin that did a number on the Fire Country. If they want the bodies of Chiashi and the Suna-nins back, gave it to them, but only after our department had examined them thoroughly. We deserve an answer." the Hokage finally decided, and his advisor nodded at his decision.

"I suppose that you are dumping all this Suna foreign relation stuff on me to deal with?" Shikaku asked in an annoying voice, but the Hokage just laughed.

"That's why you are here, Shikaku, I would have never have taken this job without having the assurance you are here."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I wasn't having a nightmare, I swear I wasn't having a nightmare. Because in order for it to be a nightmare, I had to be sure it was a dream, an illusion. No, the numbness definitely felt real, and it injected a whole ton of fear in me.

I couldn't move my hands, my legs or anything. I opened my eyes, panicking, wondering if I was turned into a puppet. _God damn It!_ I couldn't move at all!

My mind was racing a mile a second, but before I could drive myself insane, I almost laughed in joy realizing I could still feel the soft bed sheet under me; I could still smell the antiseptic lingering in the air. I was at a hospital, heavily sedated so I couldn't feel any lingering pain.

I moved my dizzy head slowly towards my left hand. I couldn't feel anything on that hands from elbow and down, and I hope it wasn't gone or anything. I eyed it annoyingly, seeing as my left hand was wrapped in thick bandages.

I guess I really only had myself to blame for that. I got mad, I got scared, so I went ahead and recklessly punched a hole in his chest. Now along with the fact that I had no fingernails on this hand, my hand was probably ruined from the lightning release, which is totally a cheap failed copy of Kakashi's Chidori.

I closed my eyes and stayed silent. I didn't feel the pain anymore, not physically at least. But I still remembered the sensation of everything burning inside of me. Trauma: a type of damage to the psyche that occurs as a result of a severely distressing event. Right, we were back to that. The same method, the same coping strategy, so it will definitely work, right?

"Artemis", I murmured, so those memories saved me. Why? Why was I still holding on to that? Kami knows why. I wanted to roll over and bury my face into the soft pillow, but I couldn't move. My right arm was placed in a cast, and I only had myself to blame at that as well. I dislocated my own shoulder after all.

My body tensed in fear as I felt a new presence in my room. I was afraid, I was really afraid, afraid of the unknown. As if feeling the change in my emotion, the figure walked out of the shadow and showed himself.

Itachi, my beloved brother, was standing by the window, dressed in his Anbu clothes. His dark eyes were staring at my left arm. He looked fresh out of a mission, and I could pretty much guess what mission he was in when he arrived in my hospital room so quickly. It's the middle of the night, even Shun, who lived with me, wouldn't be getting the information until tomorrow.

"I miss you." Dumbest thing I've ever said, "I haven't seen you since forever." I haven't talked to him ever since two years ago. It's not that I didn't want to see him, but I couldn't find him.

"Sorry, I was on missions." he said quietly. The tension in the room was strained, if it got any thicker, it might suffocate me.

"You are avoiding me." There we go. Cat's out of the bag, emotions leaked out. Yeah, he left me, and I felt lonely. I was alone for three days, but it felt like forever. I was alone.

"I'm not avoiding you, the missions are busy…" he quickly went on to explain, but I cut him off.

"You _are_ avoiding me. Why?" I hated the fact that I was being pushy, I was being melodramatic. He's Itachi, he was busy, and he was in Anbu because of me. So what am I angry about?

"I… I thought you wouldn't want to see me, after…" he started with a calm voice, but then his voice faltered until I couldn't hear him anymore.

"So what, you 'thought'? Do I have to go to ICU for you to come and see me for five minutes." I said with a tiny bit of rage in my voice. I was being unfair, I was being immature and I was being emotional.

"No, that's not what I meant, Mai, I...I just wanted you to be free from the Uchihas. I imagined you don't want to see me anymore, after what I said to you, after what I did." He said in a gentle voice, and he sounded guilty even though he didn't do anything wrong.

"But you left me alone! I was scared, Itachi! I was scared that no one will ever come! And then I would really break in that place, alone!" I wasn't screaming, I really wasn't screaming. Was this… an emotional breakdown? It had been too long since I talked to him, and I didn't even realize this before, but he was my emotional support, he was my pillar. Growing up again in this world changed me. I would have never said I fear loneliness back in my previous life. How do you fear something you'd known for the entirety of your life?

"I'm sorry, I didn't know. If I'd known…" He must be mumbling in guilt again, and now I was feeling guilty as well.

"Damn it! Stop saying sorry! I don't want your sorry, I just want to see you. I never blamed you for anything. You just have to be there, not running away whenever I tried to talk to you." I said in a frustrating voice, resisting the urge to smack his head using… nevermind, I couldn't do anything.

"Yes, whatever you say, Mai. I didn't realize that before and I thought you'd probably be better off without me around. Now, I'll come and see you more often. Well, as often as I can in between missions." he walked closer, and eventually he sat by my bed.

"Whatever I say?" I asked teasingly. I was totally exploiting my brother like a little sister should be. What the hell? This was an evolutionary throwback, this should have happened when I was five, not eleven. What was I doing at five? Right, trying my hardest to break his bones.

"Whatever you say." He confirmed and gave me a smile.

"Then, stay with me for a while, I don't want to be alone, seeing I probably won't go to sleep for the night again. Of course, only if you are not busy!" I made the childish claim and Itachi nodded. I relaxed my head back onto the pillow as I felt him settle down on the hospital bed.

This feels nice, to have someone with me, knowing that I can place my faith on someone, knowing that I'm not alone.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"I am not psychologically traumatized." I said for the fifth time in the hour, sitting uncomfortably on one of the fluffy couches Yamanaka Inoichi had in his treatment room.

"That's for me to say, Maiko-chan. You went through a very distressful experience, and I think you don't have to restrain yourself so hard." Inoichi-san, who insisted me to call him that instead of Yamanaka-san, tried to explain to me.

"But I'm not restraining myself. Yes, it was painful, and I'm still going through physical therapy for my arm, but I am not going to go insane because of it." I said with exasperation, trying to convince him to let me go. He did a psych evaluation on me the day after I woke up, and I was cleared for insanity. However, he still insisted I come in for therapy sessions, he said it was standard stuff for shinobi who had a mission gone bad.

"Do you experience any extreme negative emotions now when you think about the event?" He asked, writing something down on his notepad, which I hoped wasn't notes about me being in self-denial.

"No, I'm recovered. I told you I no longer have nightmares now, and I don't have fits whenever you ask me to reminiscent about the event." I tried to convince him to stop the sessions, and what I said had been true. I had it under control, I used my old strategy, the trauma was managed, and the emotions are pushed out, buried and sealed. I stopped getting the nightmares and phantom pains after one month in the hospital. Now two months had passed, and I was finally discharged from the hospital this morning, with all my motor functions and chakra functions recovered.

"It's not about fits or nightmares, Maiko-chan, untreated emotions can be buried temporarily and you may not realize it, but it can't be forever." He said again, realizing he's not going to get anywhere with me.

"I understand that. But I am fully functional right now like I've always been. Thank you for your help and kindness really, but I don't think I need the therapy lessons." I tried again, and this time, Inoichi-san sighed, and he let me return home.

I gathered my stuff from the hospital before I went back to the apartment, apparently, they found my swords and weapon pouch intact. I hugged the twin swords in front of my chest, feeling the familiar sense of security. My left hand was still recovering, the lightning chakra almost fried my hands open, but that's mostly healed and there's no paralyzing effect or any of the nerve damage lightning chakra usually brought. However, my fingernails were still in the process of regrowing, the doctors said that it will be another month before it can be regrown. So now, I had bandages around the hand to keep it covered.

I stared at the bandage wrapped hand, and suddenly an image of my nailless bloodied hand stared back at me. I almost flinched, but I didn't, I stared at the unpleasant image until it faded away. It was getting better, at least I didn't feel the pain along with the image anymore.

When I walked down the familiar alley and opened my apartment door, I saw Shun sitting by the table, with his eyebrows scrunched together, looking like he was in deep thoughts.

"What are you trying to accomplish, destroying your brain cell like that." I said to him sarcastically.

"Trying to decide what to do with your room, rent it out or change it into an interrogation room. Inoichi-shishou said I need practice." He said with a completely serious face.

"Not funny. Okay, I know that I wasn't paying the rent for two months, but hey, that mission was officially been upgraded to A-rank, and since technically I killed Chiashi, I received a paycheck for the mission. So now, I have enough to pay you back." I said to him as I put my stuff down on the table, and poured myself a cup of tea.

"Kidding, Maiko, I'm hurt you think this low of me. Akira-sensei already paid for your share when you were in the hospital, so you can go pay him back." Shun feigned an injured expression, like hell I would fall for that.

"Got it. I'm going to crash in my bed. I need to start the training again, or my skills will be slacking." I said and I finished the tea.

"Why are you so excited about training, Akira-sensei will probably give you the special training because you've been slacking for two months. Also, Hatake-san will probably make you wait forever because you tried and failed to copy his Chidori when he told you not to." Shun said to me in a dreadful voice, and I winced at the prospect of that. Akira-shishou's special training was like a kenjutsu buffet from hell.

"In my defense, that wasn't Chidori, it was only some lightning chakra ran wild. Wait, how did Kakashi-sensei know I tried to use lightning chakra to cut someone's heart open?" I asked Shun curiously, and he just raised his eyebrow, asking me silently 'really?'.

"What do you think, he's an Anbu Captain, he led the mission." Shun explained briefly and I nodded in understanding. After I finished processing the information, I was about to go to my room, but Shun spoke up behind me.

"By the way, Inoichi-shishou asked me to talk to you about continuing the therapy."

"And are you going to?" I asked without turning back.

"No, I don't meddle in your affairs. But just you know, I'm always open if you want to talk about anything, well anything except for the girl stuff." Shun answered in his usual sleek remarks. But I smiled and shook my head a little before walking away.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I placed my head into my hands as I stared at the yakiniku in front of me. _This is embarrassing_ , I thought, I haven't had a birthday celebration since...since somewhere in my childhood.

"Please tell me you are not going to stare at the meat the whole time." Shisui teased me from the seat across the table. Itachi was sitting next to him. The weirdest thing was, Freaking Kakashi of the Sharingan was sitting in the booth's corner, and I wasn't sure why.

"I'm sorry, but are you sure you can be here, Kakashi-sensei," I asked quietly, not sure how to approach this question.

"So, am I not welcome here?" Kakashi-sensei asked, although I couldn't tell his real emotion with the mask on.

"No, of course not, it's just, I mean, you seemed to be busy all the time, and we only see each other like once a week, and we never see each other for more than thirty minutes. Hell, a few months ago, you were mad at me for trying out your Chidori, which I repeat again, it's not a pathetic failed attempt of Chidori, it's honestly the most destructive thing I could do at that moment. But still, you left me waiting for five hours every time we had a training session in a month, which is a new record. So why are you agreeing to celebrate my birthday with me, in a restaurant?" I asked, telling him all my thoughts. It was the way we communicated the best right from the start, the mystery thing just didn't serve well for us.

"Well, I might have been a bit harsh on you for that. So I thought, how would you like to learn something interesting next time. Something that won't make you fry your arm when you are using it." Kakashi suggested ambiguously, but I quickly caught up to the meaning behind his words.

"You are going to teach me Chidori." I awed, and Kakashi nodded, "Are you serious?" I asked again, just to make sure, and he nodded again. "Even though you totally just avoided my question, but I'm going to let it pass because that's the best birthday gift ever. Thank you so much!" If there was something I like no matter what, it was strong fighting techniques.

"Hey, don't you jump to conclusion, you haven't seen Itachi's or my gift yet." Shisui said to me from the other side of the table, and I stared at him teasingly.

"If you are teaching me an A-rank jutsu, then we can talk about it." I said with an innocent smile.

"Excuse me, who taught you body flicker, if not for that, then the amount of bone breaking you can do will decrease by half at least." Shisui objected, and I simply rolled my eyes.

"By the way, who else is coming, Hime? Cause the yakiniku is about ready." Shisui asked curiously as he changed the topic casually.

"Hmm, Akira-sensei is on a mission, but he will be back later for Kenjutsu lesson. Shun is also on a mission, and he won't be back for another three days at least. I think Sasuke should be here any minute if he managed to convince father that he was going to a friend's house." Just as I was counting, wondering if he sneaked past father yet, Sasuke arrived. To be fair, I heard him before I saw him.

"Mai-nee-chan!" I snapped my head just in time to see the small figure crashing into me. Sasuke jumped into my arm and proceeded to stay there as I adjusted my balance.

"Hey, Sasuke, how are you?" I asked him with a laughter as I put him on on the seat beside me.

"Not much, Nee-chan. Well, look what I've got." Sasuke said in his particular child-like voice as he pulled off something on his back. I had to bend my body a bit to dodge the four blades swung at me when Sasuke released that monstrosity.

"What is this… is that a shuriken?" I looked at the extra-large size Shuriken, not sure what to think of it.

"Yeah, it's Fuma Shuriken! I got it in weapon training, isn't this cool!" Sasuke pushed the shuriken closer to my head, and I moved a bit to the inside of the booth to avoid being sliced open.

"Very cool, Sasuke, but let's put that away, for now, I don't want to be sliced open on my birthday." Sasuke muttered an "oops" quietly before folding the four blades away and placing it in the seat.

"Only you, Maiko. Come on, the Fuma shuriken is like every shinobi child's dream, except for you." Shisui laughed and teased, and I was tempted to throw something at him, maybe that Fuma Shuriken.

"Just… eat your meat, Shisui-senpai." I exclaimed with frustration. Sasuke looked happy eating the yakiniku, Itachi still looked stoic and detached, but that's just his usual face. As Shisui and I were chatting, throwing comments at each other, I saw Kakashi-sensei pulled out a book, the ones he usually read when we were training.

"Still reading that book, Kakashi-sensei? I thought you finished that one a week ago." I asked Kakashi, who momentarily looked up to answer my question.

"Oh, I did finish that book, this is the next one in the series." he answered briefly before returning his attention to the book again. I nodded and stopped taking notice. It's a common occurrence, and I really didn't care that much. However, I noticed Itachi staring at Kakashi's book and narrowed his eyes.

"Kakashi-senpai, please tell me you are not trying to corrupt my little sister and little brother with that kind of book, are you?" Itachi asked with disapproval and I turned my attention to him again.

"What do you mean 'corrupt' and 'that kind of book'. He told me it's romantic comedy." I asked with suspicion. I noticed Itachi glaring at Kakashi again, while Shisui was trying to hold his laughter.

"Umm, Hime, it's close to romantic comedy, but with a little bit more provocative adult contents." Shisui hinted while trying not to burst out laughing. I squinted my eyes, trying to think of what he meant.

"You mean… Oh… OH." I blinked twice and then I proceeded to glare at Kakashi, who promptly ignored me. I sighed, "You know, never mind, I don't really care about what you read, but please, not now sensei, Sasuke is here, and he is only six." Kakashi sighed as well, but he still closed the book and put it back to wherever it came from.

"What do you mean by that? Nee-chan, Nii-chan?" I almost facepalmed at Sasuke's question, oh boy, he was too innocent for that. Itachi looked nervous and in a panic, obviously not sure of what to say to save his brother's innocence. Shisui was laughing openly now and that garnered him annoying looks from Itachi.

"Okay, well, he meant… Drinking." I said the first word that came into the mind. "Drinking?", "Drinking", I confirmed. I heard Shisui muttered under his breath "They definitely do it after drinking alright." Immediately I threw my chopsticks at him. Thankfully, Sasuke quickly lost interest in this topic and went back to devouring the grilled meat.

"Stop being depressed, Itachi, you are already getting the creases under your eyes." I teased my brother, who looked as solemn as ever. Only with a selected few, I could joke around. Itachi, Shisui, Shun, Sasuke, they were my anchors to this world, and I had finally realized that. After any kind of deprivation, if one was exposed to the thing they were deprived of, then they would cling to it and thirst over it. I saw the fault in that, I clung to the feeling of family and being loved, but if one day my anchors, the things I've gained were to be taken away from me, then everything would fall apart. But I was too far gone, caught too deep in the web, and for now, I was willing to let myself sink.

"I know right, little 'Tachi here had been really hard working. I think he is going to be promoted to Captain soon." Shisui wrapped his arm around Itachi while my brother gave him an annoyed look.

"Shisui! That's supposed to be classified information!" Itachi muttered under the breath. I eyed Sasuke who was completely oblivious to the conversation; then I eyed Kakashi who was still reading his book, he seemed to understand my silent question and he said quietly "I didn't hear anything."

"Relax, Itachi-nii, that's why you are getting the creases. Although I think it's a genetic trait, seeing Father had the same crease, and Shisui-senpai had that ever since I've met him at five." I joked, ignoring the death glares Shisui sent at me.

After a while, Kakashi-sensei left without me noticing. Strangely, or not so strangely, I never saw him eating with the mask off, but his portion of the food simply disappeared. Shisui brought up the topic from the beginning of the 'party', "Hey, Hime, want to look at our gift. Itachi and I combined our effort and got it for you. Trust me, it's definitely quality over quantity." He pulled out a small pouch from Itachi's bag and handed it to me.

I opened the pouch and pulled out something. It was a small necklace, or rather, it's something akin to a choker. The black band was made of elastic fabrics and it had adjustable clasps at the end. There was a small white pearl dangling from the band. The pearl was polished but not really that shiny, rather, it felt uniquely comfortable.

While I was admiring the work. Shisui explained the gift. "The pearl is from Itachi, he brought it back from a mission in the Land of Waves. He was thinking of making it a ring or something, but I told him that any accessory on fingers is not a good idea for kenjutsu specialist, so I made the necklace for ya."

I was about to say something, but I didn't know what to say without it sounds cheesy. Thankfully, they didn't need me to say it, I could understand from their lighthearted smile that they knew my gratitude.

"Want me to put it on for you?" Shisui asked cheerfully and I raised my hand for a 'be my guest' gesture.

Shisui moved to my side of the booth, moving Sasuke to Itachi's side. As Shisui carefully lifted my hair and placed the necklace on my neck, Sasuke pouted and whined: "Shisui-nii, not fair, you always take Itachi-nii to train, and now you are taking up Mai-nee's space."

I chuckled at the childish complaint, it seemed that Sasuke still hadn't forgotten all the time Itachi and I had to blow off his play date for training. I teased: "Looks like you got a rival, Shisui-senpai."

Shisui laughed as he finished tying one of the clasps and let the necklace choker rest against my neck. The fabric was soft and elastic, so it felt just right around my neck, not too big and not too small, and the pearl pendant left a cooling touch on my neck. Strangely enough, Shisui did not immediately retract his hand, instead, he hugged his arm around me and rested his head on my shoulder. My eyebrows flinched for second, feeling the uncomfortable foreign touch. It was so tempting to grab his arm and fling him off, my body was screaming to defend myself against a foreign touch. But, I just let him be, this time only.

"You should choose me, I can be your knight in shining armour." Shisui joked lightly.

"Not really my type."

"Then tell me, what is your type?"

"I don't have a type, but if I do, the knight in shining armour will definitely be the last one the list."

... It was a good party, probably the warmest party I've ever had in my thirty years of existence.

* * *

A/N: So there is my happier chapter (ah... I kinda suck at it). So please review and comment with any criticism, since I don't really know how to write them.

This chapter is kinda short, 5600 words (which is why I feel like I didn't get to my self-determined quota of 6000). But considering last week I updated 7000 words, I thought you may give me a pass.

Arc one is almost done, just two more chapter and one more very important event to address. So stay tuned next week for that very important event, which some of you might have some ideas to what it is already.

Thank you for reading!


	13. Chapter 13 - Things Fall Apart

A/N: so I have some time this week, and I finished this chapter early. I don't know why am I so enthusiastic about writing this chapter, because, warning: massacre is this chapter. I dropped all kind of hints in the previous chapters, and I'm sorry, it's here. However, I suppose that my readers deserve to get this chapter over with and they deserve an answer. Before you decide to drop it, I sincerely hope you can read until the end and listen to my reasoning, so I'll leave the rest until the chapter is done and let you read. At least, it starts really happy with Naruto's first appearance.

Beta'd by the fantastic Alice J

* * *

Chapter 13 - Things Fall Apart

Sasuke started the Academy soon after he turned six. He was excited, like a newborn lion, ready to show his abilities to the world, especially to Father. From some of my conversations with mom, my father had planned for Sasuke to graduate at nine or ten, as opposed to the usual age of twelve. Since Father didn't particularly care about Sasuke's life at Academy except for his grades, I had the opportunity of walking him home sometimes from the Academy. I could stay with him for half of the trip, then I had to leave when we got too close to the Uchiha compound.

I had just gotten home from a B-rank mission, a B-rank mission in which I was the leader. After my accidental completion of the A-rank mission, Akira-sensei suggested that I be assessed for leading a B-rank mission myself. We went on a B-rank missing-nin hunting mission with another two Chunin and Akira-sensei became my observer, only stepping in when we couldn't handle ourselves. He never had to, from the moment we left the village to the moment I cut off the missing-nin's head, I was leading the team. After that, I was allowed to lead B-rank missions and most of my mission ranks got bumped up to B-rank.

I stood in front of the Academy gate, looking as composed and scary as a twelve-year-old could be. Sasuke should be out in… about right now. I waited silently until kids started to flood out of the Academy gates, and searched for any sign of my little brother. Finally, I caught the sight of his spiked black hair and rushed to him.

Usually, he would spot me at once and approach me quickly, but today, he seemed to be in a conversation with somebody and he didn't notice me. When I say conversation, I actually meant Sasuke with his best 'I don't care' face (he learned that from Itachi) mixed with his original 'get lost' face, arguing with a boy who looked as young as he was with blond hair that radiate sun rays.

"Stop following me, Uzumaki! I don't want to spar with you." I could hear my brother yell in a childish voice. It's kinda strange and funny, did I sound like that when I was threatening to break Shisui and Itachi's bones?

"Stop in the track, teme, you afraid I'm gonna beat you to the ground?" The blonde boy responded. This one definitely had some guts, but my mom would be horrified by his use of words.

"You can never beat me, Uzumaki, so stop annoying me, I have things to do." Sasuke yelled back, clearly wanting to shake his little (hostile) follower off. That's when he saw me and immediately approached me with a smile.

"Mai-nee, sorry I was late, I got a little caught up. Anyway, let's go, we can hang out longer today." Sasuke said happily and I raised an eyebrow, waiting for the explanation, and he continued, "Father left for some serious clan business today and he won't be back with all the elders until at least tomorrow. So mom was left in charge of my genjutsu training today, and she won't mind if I stay with you longer. In fact, I think she secretly encourages me to stay out today with you, as long as you won't lose me." I reached my hands to ruffle his head, and he ducked before grunted something like "stop treating me like a kid". But he was a kid, and I wish he could stay like a kid, not something father wanted to turn him into.

"Don't ignore me! I'm gonna beat you to the ground, dattebayo!" I looked up to see the blonde kid yelling as he quickly approaches Sasuke. When he saw me, he halted a bit and paused.

"I see you made some… interesting friends, Sasuke, mind giving me an introduction?" I asked Sasuke as he groaned.

"He is Uzumaki Naruto, the dead last of the class, and no, he is not my friend." He explained as turned his head toward the blonde kid with annoyance, then he yelled at the blonde kid - Uzumaki Naruto - loudly, "Loser, this is my sister, and like I told you, I have stuff to do to so get lost."

I took a mental note at Sasuke's attitude. He was always a competitive child, being pitted with your genius siblings would do that to you, but I guess some of the Clan arrogance must have rubbed off on him. Granted, Itachi and I weren't really subtle about our ability, although we kind of didn't have a choice in that matter, but we tried hard to tone down the Uchiha arrogance. Sasuke, well, he was young, he would improve later.

"Don't run away, teme, I'm definitely going to beat you and I'm going to be the Hokage one day, dattebayo!" I watched the blonde boy with interest, just by looking at how pissed off Sasuke was, one could tell how persistent he was. By the way, his clothes were covered in dirt, he was probably beaten in the Academy taijutsu training, most likely by Sasuke. But his voice had no malicious intent in it, he was simply aiming for the top, not the retribution.

"Like that will ever happen, dead last. Ignore him, Mai-nee, let's go." Sasuke attempted to drag me away, but I stopped him and an idea forming in my head. _Sasuke is so not going to like it,_ I thought.

"How about we go eat something together, Sasuke?" his eyes beamed up a bit at my words, but the light disappeared as soon as he heard my words, "And, Uzumaki-kun, you are welcome to come along." I said to a stunned blonde kid, and Sasuke seemed a bit betrayed and confused. _Sorry, Sasuke, forgive me for my selfishness, but I want to see you grow up surrounding by friends and teammates, not stepping stones._

"Really? Are you serious?" Naruto asked and I nodded. The boy jumped in joy, and I marveled at his ability to change his mood so fast. "Then, can we go eat Ramen, I know the best place!" Naruto suggested, and I raised my hand and said: "lead the way."

Sasuke came along with a temper, obviously mad at me. He didn't talk to me the whole way to the ramen shop. When we walked into the ramen shop Naruto suggested, Ichiraku Ramen, I sighed and grabbed Sasuke into a hug.

"Why are you still sulking, Sasuke, just accept it, it can't be too bad." I said to my brother as he struggled to get out of my hug. He didn't answer me, but he silently sat beside me, still giving me his stinky face.

"How about this, if you can be neutral today, not happy, just neutral, then I will teach you a ninjutsu of your choosing, although do keep it below B-rank please." I proposed to him. I could see Sasuke's face in concentration, trying to decide if the deal was worth it.

"I want Raiton: Electrifying Web." Sasuke said to me with a straight face, and I smiled.

"Electrifying Web? You are pushing it here, that's a B-rank jutsu, hard to learn as well. How about Raiton: Electrifying Line?" Electrifying Line was basically a simplified version of Electrifying web, where the lightning didn't spread like a web, but they advance in a line and char everything in its' path. I could see Sasuke's eyes beam at my words even though he tried hard to suppress it, he said "Deal!" immediately, a little too eagerly. The shop owner served us ramen with a smile, Naruto gulped it down immediately and Sasuke finally decided to take a bite.

"Teme, you got a really good sister. Hey, Nee-chan, can you teach me!" Naruto asked with ramen noodle on his face.

"Don't even think about it, dobe, you'll never learn it. Mai-nee is a genius, her jutsu is too powerful for you." Sasuke spatted out before I could answer. I saw Naruto's eyes flare up and decided to intervene before another fight could break out.

"Not true, Sasuke, hard work is needed for anything." I hit Sasuke's head lightly and he muttered: "Why do you care, you are a prodigy anyway".

"I heard that, but you don't live in a world full of prodigies, in order to survive under Konoha's rule, comradeship is needed. So if you want to gain influence then you need to learn that." I said to Sasuke calmly. I was not going to tell him that he needed others to survive, or that he needed to be sociable, that was kind of hypocritical of me.

"Think about it Sasuke, if you don't like the empty encouraging words, think about it practically." Sasuke nodded lightly at my words and proceeded to eat his ramen.

"So, why do you want to learn my jutsu, Uzumaki-kun." I asked Naruto next and he responded quickly "I want to be Sasuke's rival, and I will beat him fair and square!" Cute kid, he reminded me of someone from a memory long ago. _Don't die, Uzumaki Naruto, stay alive._

"To be honest, I don't think my lightning jutsu would be fitting for you. How about some taijutsu. Don't put so many hopes on me, I'm not a good or reliable teacher. If you want to beat my little brother, then you need to trash him one day using your own style. Also, Sasuke, I'm rooting for you, so don't get conceited."

"Awesome! You hear that Sasuke, one day I will beat you! Dattebayo!"

"Like hell, say that when you are not dead last, you dobe."

I didn't know at that time, that Uzumaki Naruto would be the one changing this world so much.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

When you put the weight of your whole existence into one strong pillar, yet when that pillar cracks, things start to get shaky. When that pillar broke completely and there was nothing anchoring your world, then things fall apart.

The pillar started to crack when Shisui died.

Shun told me in the morning, early enough that I was still feeling sleep, but immediately after hearing it, all my sleepiness were gone, replaced by the chilling cold running down my spine.

"You might want to sit down for this" I did, "But I received words, that Uchiha Shisui was dead yesterday." _What._

"The official report from the Uchihas said he committed suicide, and his body was never found." Shun continued before I could register the words, he seemed determined to get everything out before I started to panic.

"What about Itachi, was he with him? How? Why did he… are you sure?" I bombarded Shun with a string of questions he couldn't answer. He did, however, tell me "Uchiha Itachi was reported as the last one seeing Shisui-san alive. He was the one reported the suicide and brought back the suicide note." _I need to see him, I need to see my brother, I need to know what happened._

Immediately, I found myself jumping out of the window, running for the direction of the Uchiha compound, vaguely hearing Shun yelling at me "Don't do anything stupid, you don't know what happened!"

 _You are damn right I don't, but I'm going to find out._

I ran past the streets of Konoha, still too early for the businesses to settle in. The Uchiha compound was on the outskirt of the village, apparently, it was a form of exilement and supervision from the village. For what, I don't know, and I didn't really care at the moment.

Even before I broke into the compound I was exiled from, I heard the loud commotion. There were a few bangs, a few screams, and a few curses. I slowed down in front of the gate, just in time to get out of the way so an angry Itachi wouldn't crash into me when he furiously left the compound entrance.

"You monster! Traitor! Don't ever come back!" I snapped my head at the screaming and peeked inside the entrance. Five Uchiha men were on the ground, clearly feeling the pain of the impact. Seeing as my brother was the only one standing and walking, I could almost see with my own eyes what happened moments before I came here. The real question was, why?

I turned towards my brother, who was apparently ignoring me and decided to walk on ahead. I yelled at him, trying to get him to stop, "Wait, Itachi, what happened!" The question was vague but I knew that he knew there was really only one thing I could be asking about.

He stopped for a moment as if deciding whether to tell the truth or the lie. I wanted to call him out on that, telling him to scrap the lie, but I didn't. I let him stay silent.

"He died. He committed suicide, then he died." Itachi's simple responses broke my heart. When I heard that there was no body found, I had hope that Shisui was still alive, no matter how unlikely it was. Instinctively, I knew Itachi was lying, he was lying about something, but the way he said 'he died' with such grave and deep sorrow, I knew he wasn't lying about that.

"You liar, did you kill him to activate your Mangekyou Sharingan? Of all the times… You are a monster and a traitor." One of the men on the ground yelled in anger. Itachi ignored him and continued to walk away from the compound.

"No, I don't believe that! How do you expect me to believe any of that! Tell me the truth, Itachi, what happened to Shisui." I ran after him and yelled. I didn't believe it, the idea that Shisui would commit suicide, the idea that Itachi would kill him for something so trivial as power. Even the idea that Shisui had died, I couldn't believe it.

"I'm telling you the truth. Shisui died, and I saw him die." Suddenly, he turned around. I was stunned by the redness of his eyes, so red as if it was dyed by blood. On the crimson iris, there was the black pattern I wasn't familiar with. It wasn't the usual three tomoe sharingan, it was some design more elaborate. It was Mangekyou Sharingans, the best proof that Shisui indeed had died and Itachi was the first-hand witness of it.

"I told you to stay out of the clan matter, Maiko. So stay out of it." There it was again, that icy tone I thought I would never hear again. Itachi seemed so detached, so far away from me now. I thought I understood him the best aside from Shisui, but now, I couldn't read him at all.

"This is not a clan matter, Shisui was my friend, and you are my brother. Please, I just want to know what happened!" my voice snapped at him, it was mixed with rage and desperation. I was pleading with him, something was going on here that I didn't know about, and he was keeping it from me.

"It was his choice, and it has nothing to do with you. So stop asking and go. You are not an Uchiha anymore." Just like that, he broke me away from him, snipping the string between us. He was leaving again, turning his body away and ready to disappear.

"No. You are not running away again!" I screamed at him and used body flicker to get in front of him. I wanted to catch him, I wanted to stop him from leaving. But when I finished the body flicker, Itachi was gone without the trace. In fact, it seemed that I never even used the body flicker, since my position was still the same as before.

 _Genjutsu,_ I suddenly realized, Itachi placed me under a genjutsu. He had never even been here to have this conversation with me, it was all an illusion.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I was pacing the room repeatedly. The night had already fallen and the view outside the window was veiled by darkness. Shun was sitting on the couch, watching me pace the room. He knew that I wanted to be left alone, quietly thinking my brain away at this impossible puzzle, so he didn't talk to me.

Why wasn't I crying? I should be crying. Shisui was my friend, one of the closest since I was five. So why wasn't I crying? _Think through the mystery before you cry,_ I thought to myself, I refused to cry before knowing what the hell happened.

The chances were, Shisui was indeed dead. Even if there was no body found, Itachi's eyes were the best proof that Shisui had died. The Mangekyou Sharingan can only be activated from the trauma of losing someone close to you first hand, I had learned that when I told my father about the temporary irritation in my eyes after Daichi was killed. He explained the criteria for Mangekyou Sharingan to me, after witnessing the death of a loved one, the Uchiha's sharingan will start to irritate until either the Mangekyou was activated, or the pain fades and nothing happens because the trauma wasn't enough.

With a painful heart, I had to disregard the possibility that Shisui is alive for now. So that left the question of what happened to his body. Shun, being in the intelligence division, told me that Shisui was reported as a suicide by jumping off of the cliff. The Uchihas searched for his body to recover his sharingans. However, they couldn't find anything in the river, or under the cliff. That meant Shisui's body was either retrieved by something before the Uchihas or that it was destroyed, along with his sharingans.

The chance of Shisui's body being retrieved by someone else was not unlikely, but if his body was truly destroyed, then it could only be by his own hands or by Itachi's. Unless, there was someone else around to pick up everything. This line of thought left two conclusions, that Shisui's body was being collected and used, or that his body was destroyed to hide something. Both of which were not pleasant conclusions.

There were just so many unanswered questions, so much uncertainty, and so much bullshit. Why the hell was he and Itachi even there in the first place, and why were the Uchiha clan members angry at Itachi, even more than usual. They were twitchy and angry, not just because of his Mangekyou Sharingans, they mentioned something about the special timing of the events. Something was definitely happening that I didn't know about.

I tightened my fingers and dug my fingers into my arms. I was missing a lot of information, and even Shun couldn't give me more information since the Clan didn't really report much. Suddenly, I remembered something Shun said, he said that Itachi brought back Shisui's suicide note.

 _I need to find it, it's my only clue now._

Without anymore thinking about how dangerous it was to break into the Uchiha compound when there are a whole lot of sharingan users keeping watch, I grabbed my swords and jumped out of the window.

All the way toward the compound, I was thinking about how I was supposed to get past the security. However, the moment I got to the compound, I realized that all of that didn't matter now because something was wrong, something was horribly wrong.

I was immediately alerted by the horribly pungent smell of blood. It was a smell I was so terribly familiar with, so instead of blocking my senses, it sharpened my attention. The next thing I noticed is the fact that all the security and the traps have been deactivated.

I flickered inside the gates in the blink of an eye, I thought I had prepared for some unforeseen circumstances, but this was something else.

The body count started to rack up from the entrance. The streets inside the compound were filled with bodies. Some were lying motionlessly on the ground, blood stained or dismembered. Some were stuck on the walls by shurikens and kunai, with gaping holes in their chests, blood flowing a river under them. Men, women, children, adults, seniors… no one was spared.

My blood ran cold as if just realizing the scene in front of me. I thought of what this meant, it's implication. This was not an attack, this was a genocide, a massacre. _Oh God, Itachi, Sasuke, Mom!_

I blitzed through the streets, only stopping to check the body just to make sure my worst nightmare didn't come true. I didn't find a single soul alive, but I also didn't find my immediate families' bodies. The main house, I realized, that's where my families would be if they were home.

My body moved before I could even register the flaws in my actions. For example, I didn't think about how could the whole clan be killed in one day; nor did I think about who it would be. I could be running to my death, but I couldn't turn back now, I wouldn't.

The main house was dark, like the rest of the streets. I couldn't hear anything from the main house, it was emitting a silent dread just like the rest of the compound. I rushed through the now stained red greeneries around the house, ignoring the dead bodies at my feet every three meters I moved. I was so close to the closed doors, closed but not locked. Just one movement and I could discover the reality I'd been dreading for, and I was scared. I shook away my hesitation immediately, then I raised my hands, grabbed the handle and slid the door open.

At first, I registered my parents, they were kneeling down on the ground together without a care in the world. There was no blood, no red, and no holes. They were alive! I though for one wishful moment.

But then, I saw the glistening sword raised above their heads. When I recognized who was holding the sword, I was appalled, I was horrified, and I was shocked to the point that I couldn't even move.

Itachi, my brother, was holding a blood-stained sword, over our parents' head. _It's him… No, it's not him… It's him._

From the moment of my entry, the deathly tranquility in the room was broken. My mother brought her hands over her mouth and covered a surprised cry. My father snapped his head up to look at me with disbelief. And my brother, oh, Itachi was still holding his sword, as still as ever, but he also looked towards me. There was a brief moment of shock in his eyes before his Mangekyou Sharingan turned back to as cold as stones.

There was a moment where everything was frozen before Itachi brought his sword down on our parents. I moved, or rather, my body moved. It was the naturally trained instinct of a soldier that allowed my hands to reach for my weapon even if my head wasn't functioning.

I flickered in front of my parents and moved my ninjatō up to blocked the glistening sword. Two metal blades clashed in mid-air, a few centimeters above father's head.

"Why! Give me a reason! Why!" I yelled furiously at Itachi, who was still staring at me coldly. He didn't answer me, instead, he twisted his sword to break free of my blade. Then, his movement was a blur.

He was fast, so much faster than what I expected. He blurred behind me and punched me in the waist. I was surprised by the speed and the force, so before I could respond to it, I was falling forward, crashing into mom. However, before I could fall down, Itachi grabbed my shoulder and pulled me back. He kicked me in the ribs and sent me flying toward the wall.

The impact knocked the air out of me. Along with the searing pain of a broken rib, the pain in my torso made me gasp for oxygen. I was falling down along the wall, at least that was before I felt a sharp pain in my stomach. My fall was halted, by a sword that impaled my abdominal region and embedded itself into the wall behind me.

I heard my mom letting out a cry, and I forced myself to look up from the wound gushing blood on my stomach. The earlier adrenaline eased my pain, but now, it was coming back. My chest was feeling suffocated, a tight weight pushing it down along with the pain from the broken rib. My stomach completely erupted in pain. The sword was keeping me on the wall, but it was also piercing a bigger and bigger hole on my stomach. I was loosing blood fast as there was already a small stream of blood running down the wall and collecting into a pool of red at the ground.

My parents were still kneeling down before their son, before their impending doom, like sinners asking for forgiveness. I wanted to yell at them asking them why aren't they moving, but I had a sinking feeling that they won't answer.

"Why? Why are you doing this? Please, tell me why?" I wasn't really asking at the end. I was pleading. I didn't really want an answer, I want this whole ordeal to stop. _Please, Itachi, you can stop now, you can still stop!_

"I am cleansing the clan." That was all he answered. He pulled out another sword behind him that was also stained crimson red and raised it above my parents' heads again. They reverted back to the positions they were in before I arrived, except now, I was watching helplessly.

"Move, Mom, Father, why aren't you moving!" I yelled. They were not in a genjutsu since I could see their chakra clearly flowing, and their emotional reactions were clearly normal. Then why, why weren't they moving, waiting for the slaughter silently like lambs?

"We love you, Maiko. We really do. Please, don't be afraid. It will be over soon." Mom said in a raspy voice and she was crying with a smile. Tears were flowing out of her eyes and dripping into the floor, but she did it with a smile on her lips.

"Forgive me, Maiko. Forgive me for everything. But I am proud of you, really proud of you." Those were the only words my father had spoken to me for three years. Father had closed his eyes, but I could feel the genuine regret from his words. I shouldn't be crying, I hated him, for everything he forced me and my brothers to do for the sake of the clan. But my face was wet from the warm tears coming out of my eyes.

"Stop! Please… stop! Don't do this! Please… Itachi-nii, please!" I wailed and cried as if it was the only thing I could do. I gripped my hands on the hilt of the blade and pulled with all the strength I had left, but the blade only moved an inch and gave me a searing sharp pain. I was stuck, trapped and forced to watch the tragedy unfold.

"Do it, Itachi, do it. You have always been a gentle child. But this time, do what you have to do." Father said in a calm tone as I whimpered and yelled at him to stop. Mother had also closed her eyes now along with father as they waited silently. Itachi's grip on the sword tightened, and he raised it an inch higher as the starting moving of the swing. His red and black eyes were staring intensely into our parents, and for a moment, I thought I saw a flicker of something glistening at the corner of his eyes.

I shrieked and screamed as Itachi brought the blade down and slashed my mother and father across the neck. It was indeed quick like mom promised, but the terror wasn't over. There was a spray of blood as Itachi finished the slaying motion, and my brother, the figure I looked up to with love, the anchor of my world, was covered in scarlet red blood that accompanied his ruthless crimson eyes. It was like I saw everything in slow motion, a replay in my sharingan of my parents falling down like broken dolls. Father fell first, head into the ground, red flowing down his yukata. Then Mother followed, falling on top of Father, sprawl over his body lifelessly. I didn't even need to check for their breathing to know that they were dead immediately. Itachi's hit was concise and deep, as expected of someone trained in Anbu. There was no way my parents would survive this.

"NO!" I wailed at my dead parents, couldn't believe what he'd done. Suddenly, I felt my eyes stinging with pain. It was changing, something was changing, and it was so sorrowful and painful I wish it hadn't. I blinked my eyes, trying to stop the pain, not that it really mattered. All parts of my body hurt, and this was not making a difference. When I opened my eyes again, I realized, the horror was not over.

Sasuke was home.

I saw his small figure entering the main house, eyes widening in shock and horror. I wanted to tell him to go away, to leave, but I knew that nothing I could do that could erase this image in his head.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Mom… Dad… what's happening…" Sasuke whimpered slowly, trying to register what he was seeing. There was a lot of blood, his parents were covered in blood, lying on the floor lifelessly. He turned his head just a little, and he saw his sister, his Mai-nee-chan, pinned to the wall by a sword, struggling to get the blade off. There was a lot of blood gathering at her feet.

"What… happened." He asked again, but no one responded him. He ran straight to the main house the moment he entered the compound. He saw a lot of people lying on the floor, and there was a lot of blood, they all looked dead. No, they were dead, and now his family looked just like them.

He turned his head again, and to his shock, he saw his brother, the brother he always admired and respected. Itachi-nii-chan was holding a blade, a blade that looked frightening similar to the one pinning Mai-nee-chan on the wall.

He was about to ask, or scream, but he never got to do it, because he saw his big brother's red eyes. It wasn't the normal sharingan, but it felt more dangerous than that. Immediately, he felt his world twisted into something else, something equally real but much, much more terrifying.

Then he saw it all, the murder of his Clan members and his parents all playing in front of his eyes. He saw the person responsible for all of this. It was his admirable brother, Uchiha Itachi.

At that moment, all he could was to scream.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I cried out again as I saw Sasuke dropped to the ground and started to scream at the top of his lungs. Whatever happened to him, no, whatever Itachi did to him, it was more than just a simple genjutsu.

Once again, I clenched the hilt of the sword impaling my stomach hard and pulled with all my strength. This time, the blade moved more, and it was almost out of the wall. With a loud 'thump', I fell to the ground, straight into the pool of my own blood. The sword was still in my stomach, sticking out from one end. I could feel my consciousness fading due to the blood loss, and I had no idea if the sword had damaged any of my organs. I just needed to move towards Sasuke, I just needed to reach him.

Suddenly, I felt a burning gaze on me. With a sinking heart, I realized that Itachi had now turned his attention on me. I looked up and saw that he was looking at the area in front of me. His right eye widened and suddenly, the area in front of me was ignited in a black flame. The black flame formed a one-meter radius semi-circle around me, and it trapped me beside the wall, separating me from Sasuke.

"Don't move, this is Amaterasu, the eternal black flame. It will burn everything it touches away until there is nothing left." Itachi's cold voice rang in my ear. I didn't doubt his words, I could feel the menacing aura from the black flame. For that moment, I was aware of the fact that Sasuke stopped screaming, instead, he was convulsing on the floor. His head turned slowly towards Itachi, and I realized, he was conscious of his surroundings, no matter how limited his consciousness was.

"Both of you are too weak. So weak that you aren't even worth killing" Itachi said to us slowly, letting the words sink in our brains. "It's because of your weaknesses that you can't stop me. If you want vengeance, then start hating me now and grow stronger."

"Kill your best friend the one closest to you, that's the easiest way to get Mangekyou Sharingan, to gain power and to take revenge." He whispered, but we all heard what he was saying. He was turning around, he was leaving. He was leaving us behind.

"Stop!" I yelled desperately as I ripped the blade out of my stomach. With groans of pain, I stood up. Itachi turned around momentarily, and when he saw me, he seemed surprised at something. But I probably didn't even see that, because all I cared about was making him stop.

My left eye was hurting and it seemed to suck away all my chakra and energy. As if making a wish, there was something exploded from my left eye. Suddenly, the world stopped. Not just in my perception, but truly, it stopped.

Itachi stood silently in his position, unmoving, Sasuke's convulsing stopped. Even the black flames stopped moving, and it retained its jagged shape, like a sculpture. It was as if the time had frozen along with everyone else.

I was the only thing moving, I walked towards the flame, and I moved across it. It wasn't burning me, and it wasn't hurting me, it was as if I didn't even exist. I kept on walking, suddenly aware that some liquid was dripping down my left cheek. It was warm, but it didn't smell like tears. It smelled like blood.

Still, I kept my eyes open, staring at where I wanted to go. I wanted to reach him, I wanted to stop him, I wanted him to stop running away. I weakly walked towards him and I could feel my legs were shaking, both from the blood loss and the sudden depletion of a chunk of my of chakra.

I was so close, maybe just one meter away. I raised my shaking hands towards him, without thinking about what I was supposed to do after that. I couldn't stop him, I didn't have any weapons in my hands, he could kill me as easily as a bug.

He was only ten centimeters away from me, just a little more and I could reach him. But that was my limit, suddenly I dropped to the ground and my eyes closed, blackness then ensued my consciousness. I didn't reach Itachi, and now he was going to leave, and the thought of that hurt more than the hole in my stomach.

In that one night, the once powerful Uchiha Clan was decimated to only three blood descendants. A traitor, a child, and a cheater of death.

* * *

A/N: I want to say that this is the plan ever since I wrote chapter 9. I just couldn't find a good reason for the massacre to be stopped naturally, since, in my opinion, one of the following things must happen: a) The coup d'etat never happened (and considering how long they plotted this, it's not gonna happen), b) Danzo and his squad that ruins everything are either dead or incapacitated (so that Shisui can reverse the situation with his Sharingan and there is no need for massacre), c) Itachi refused to commit the massacre (if we continue with his reasoning in the canon, then Maiko's existence probably give him more reason to do so). The OC is not self-insert, she wouldn't know beforehand what happened in the original timeline, nor how her actions have any implications on the events. She is really 'blind' here, and she wouldn't have the power, at least not at this point to stop the killing (or to kill Danzo, which is a sound solution in my mind, but that can happen later on *hint*hint*).

I personally don't believe that timeline can be changed so easily with a small and purposeless action, rather, I think the wheels of history is such a strong force that unless you aim somewhere critical, it's going to keep going on its original path. Besides, how can one grow if there are no hardships in one's life? In the canon, I like the idea that Sasuke changed because of what happened, he just didn't change in the... right direction. So in my fanfic, I want Sasuke (and Maiko) to grow, to understand that things often aren't what they seemed (because he sure missed the point in the canon).

On a brighter note, see the character tag I put on the story, it says Itachi U., which means he is just going on a slight break and he will be back, ALIVE. And no, he will not be dead like in the canon, and yes, this traitor thing will go away eventually (and he will still be alive by that point, I love him too much for him to die). No Uchiha under my watch will go down a horrible revengeful path (Well, Obito and Madara... They are already down that road before the fanfic timeline started.. so they are technically not under my watch), and I refuse to believe that my character can't figure out the unusual circumstances and hints written all over them.

So with all the talking, I just want to say, please, give it a try and have some faith in me. This is a dark fic with sadness, but they will make one stronger. Hey, Maiko's mangekyou sharingan is here to cheer things up... (never mind, I said nothing)...

Oh yeah, the next update is still on this Saturday (I somehow managed to get a head start), so this is the first rare double update week (hopefully there will be more, but the future is bleak with my exams and all)


	14. Chapter 14 - Wither Away

A/N: As promised, the second update of the week. So this is the last chapter of Arc 1 - Anchor, and it will introduce us to the second arc where everyone has to adjust because of the massacre. So this is kind of like a conclusion, well, part conclusion.

Beta'd by the remarkable Alice J ^_^

* * *

Chapter 14 - Night-Blooming Cereus (Part I - Wither Away)

I wasn't delusional to think that all of this was just a dream, just a genjutsu. Dreams were gone when you awaken, and genjutsu could be broken once it has served its' purpose. But reality, oh, the reality was a bitch.

I regained my consciousness with a scream. "Stop!", I heard my own high-pitched voice and proceeded to flail my arms around as if grasping for something nonexistent.

Someone held me down and whispered gently, "Calm down, you are okay, you are in a hospital right now. You are okay." That was Shun's voice, his voice was always calm and collected, but this time, it didn't smooth down my panic.

"Stop! Please stop! Don't kill them." I yelled towards the empty air, but all I saw was the bright white wall in the hospital. Itachi was gone, he was truly gone. I let my arm fell on my forehead and covered my face.

"Are you okay? Maiko, are you hurting anywhere?" Shun asked me gently. I felt his hands on me besides my bed. Akira-shishou was also there, I caught a bit of his sandy hair in the corner of the room. What was I supposed to say, that everything I longed for was snatched away from me, and now I might be broken?

"Where is my little brother, where is Sasuke? Where is he?" I didn't have anything else to ask. Sasuke, well, he was all I had left. Shun didn't answer me, Shishou didn't answer me, so I asked again with my voice raised: "Where is Sasuke! I want to see him!"

"He is fine, he is in a coma right now." Shun answered me quickly.

"I want to see him." I said coldly.

"You should rest Maiko, they just stabilized you with a surgery, and you just woke up from a three-day coma. You are not in any condition to get up now." Shun argued, but I didn't care.

"Take me to him! He's the last surviving member of my family, so TAKE ME TO HIM!" When Shun stayed silent, I decided to get up and do it myself. I could feel clearly that they did a surgery on my stomach, probably to save my damaged organs. The sedative and the painkillers were making my body heavy and my head dizzy, but nevertheless, I pushed my body off of the bed and tried to stand awkwardly by holding onto the bed railing.

"Fine, I'll take you there, just don't strain yourself." Shun let out a sigh and helped me walked awkwardly. He took me slowly to the room beside mine, and he pushed the door open slightly for me. I saw my little brother, lying helplessly on the bed. He was all cleaned up, like an angel lying on a white bed. He must be getting the repercussion from the genjutsu, I had no doubt that whatever Itachi did to him, it was with the Mangekyou Sharingan.

"Will he ever wake up?" I asked lightly, he was still conscious when I passed out, but there was no telling what the effects of a strong genjutsu would be.

"I don't know, he's physically healed, but the genjutsu specialists said that he was traumatized by the genjutsu and they were not sure when he will wake up. It's all up to him now." Shun told me with no sugarcoating at all. That was so like him, he never liked to tell white lies.

"It was the Mangekyou Sharingan, he did it, he really did it." I whispered. He wouldn't kill Sasuke, would he? He left him alive, even when he could have killed him in the blink of an eye. _Just like he did with mom and dad_.

I didn't stay very long, I left quickly after seeing Sasuke was still alive and I went back to my room. "What happened to him, what happened to Itachi." I asked Akira-shishou. He was a jonin, he would know, but whether or not he would tell me, that's a different story.

To my surprise, he actually told me, "He killed his Anbu pursuers and ran away. Uchiha Itachi is declared an S-rank missing-nin." I clenched my teeth. _There's really no going back, is there?_

"Please, Shishou, Shun, leave me alone. I need to be alone to think about some stuff." I said quickly, vaguely feeling the tears start to swell up in my eyes. Shun wanted to protest, but Akira-shishou pulled him away. I dipped my head to thank him before slamming the room door shut. Then I crouched down in the corner and let the tears fall.

The hell just happened? It wasn't devastation for the loss of lives, it was a cold thing to say, but the Uchiha clan was not the most important thing to me. I didn't feel any obligation for the clan, nor do I mourn for the clan's death. I was a selfish person, the only ones I mourned for was Shisui and my parents. But what really made me felt helpless and desperate was the confusion, the mystery. Why did they die? Why were they killed? No one could tell me that, and it felt like everything was destroyed before I was even conscious of it.

 _Don't cry until the mystery is solved_ , I told myself that once, but now, I was crying with the mystery still hanging. _Did I even care about the answers? Or was I just lamenting my fate where when I finally find a reason to anchor myself to the world, it goes away like a poof. Why was I even complaining, I was a sinner anyway. How many people have I killed, how many families have I torn apart, how many families have mourned because of me? So was this life a retribution for my last? If that were the case, then why did I even try to make a difference? Why did I even try to love people and expect that love back. If this was a world that already had its script written down like a story, then why was I even here?_

"Damn it… it's all gone now…" I sobbed helplessly, burying my face in my laps. It was all just a dream in the end. A dream with a bad start, a hopeful transition and eventually, it ended with disappointment and heartbreak. They say you only live once, but I lived twice. Somehow, I cheated death once. That sounds funny, actually, really funny. Out of all things, I cheated death, or maybe there were others, but I just didn't know.

I started laughing, cracking under the pressure and madness. "I don't know, I don't know. What do you want me to know? I don't know…" I was mumbling nonsense. I was so confused, so confused. Everything was so strange, what are you trying to tell me, Itachi? What are you trying to show me, Mom? What do you want me to know, Shisui? Why were you all acting like this? _What. Am. I. Suppose. To. Know._ I am tired of trying to figure out the mystery, it's so complicated, too complicated. What was the point? Even if I figured out why you killed our family, Itachi, you could never come back. Even if I figured out what the hell was wrong with the clan, they were all gone.

"Ahh!" I screamed and covered my face, I just wanted to scream and forget everything. But, there was Sasuke, my only pillar left. He would want answers, he would want conclusions and he would want revenge. I couldn't just let him do that, he would get himself killed, or worse, get himself killed for the wrong reason. He is like one of those younger operatives who were impulsive and oblivious. Their emotions were obvious and their actions were straight forward. Stupid. Child. He would get himself killed.

"Get out! Whoever is here, get the hell out!" I yelled out annoyingly when I heard something rustling by the window. At this point, I didn't give a damn if it was the Anbu or even the Hokage. I was mad, crazy mad. There was a small wind and then he appeared. Hatake Kakashi was in his Anbu uniform with his hound mask on, but I knew it was him.

"What the hell?" I muttered. Right, the Hokage probably commanded Anbu to watch over the survivors; clan massacres were definitely not a small incident in the village. But they were supposed to be silent. If Kakashi of the Sharingan wanted to be silent, I would never find him in a million years.

"You are having an emotional breakdown." He said calmly to me.

"Am I not allowed to? I just had my family killed by my brother." I retorted, an emotional breakdown was the least of my problems right now. I was lost with what to do, drowning in a sea of 'why'. There were so many things that made no sense, I felt like I missed something critical, or maybe I just missed everything because I ran away. He stayed silent and still.

 _I ran away. I was a coward. I ran away and now I am a lost child. Suffocating, asphyxiating. I couldn't breathe. I am drowning in sadness, in mystery, in my own cowardliness. In the end, I have no one but myself to blame._

"You know, there's a kind of flower called the night-blooming cereus. The legend says that it only blooms once in its lifetime at night, and then it dies. Some people say that they use up all their life energy for one bloom, one show, one most beautiful night. But what if they aren't that selfless, using all they had for a one hit wonder? What if they wanted it to last longer, what if they just wanted to hold on to it, because the feeling of blooming is ecstasy like and addictive. It's like the cruelest joke ever, knowing that it will be short-lived, yet you still have to experience that. Every moment, it's tempting the flowers, asking them to bloom and they do, even if knowing that they will fall afterward." I ranted, not sure what exactly I was saying, or how I expected my Anbu listener to respond to it. That story, that flower, I thought I remembered it… from where? From whom? From when? It was _a_ memory. It was _my_ memory. There should be another part of it, shouldn't it? Beyond the sadness, the regret. But I couldn't quite remember it.

"If you don't want to wither away, then find something to hold on to." my temporary sensei said to me and I let out a desperate laugh.

"Stop asking me to do something! I don't know what to do! I don't know anything!" I screamed at him even though he did not do anything wrong. At the end of my temper tantrum, I whispered in defeat: "I am tired, really tired. So tired that I just want every question to stop plaguing me."

"I'm probably the worst choice to be giving you advice for an emotional breakdown; you need to ask your Shishou for that. But I imagine you don't want to do that for now." he was right, I really don't. "You just need something, anything, no matter how small. Duty, responsibility, hope, vengeance. Anything."

"Vengeance? Sasuke will probably hold on to the hate now, knowing him, that stupid little child. He doesn't want answers, he wants vengeance. He can be unreasonable like that, always eyeing the results, not the process." I muttered, analyzing my brother to avoid thinking about something else. I wonder why I didn't realize this earlier, Sasuke was always so obvious, but I guess I never had to worry about his flaws until now.

"Then do you want vengeance? To be fair, it's probably easier for you if you do."

"Most likely true, but I don't know. I want answers, and if vengeance is a part of the answer, then yeah, sure why not. Sasuke would want revenge by killing Itachi, but I don't want to do that just yet. I want a conclusion, I want him to explain to me what the hell is going on. Depending on his answer, I may or may not kill him. He freaking just left me, left this mess to me. That little…" I punched the wall behind me, trying to think up what he was now. I hated him, he killed our parents. I loved him because he was my brother. I didn't really want to kill him because I both hated and loved him. I felt the rage flare up inside me and when I looked up again to face Kakashi, he was staring at my eyes.

"What?" I asked annoyingly.

"Your eyes… they are different" Kakashi answered me slowly as if he wasn't sure how to react to it. I got up immediately, ignoring the numbness and pain in my body and I stumbled into the bathroom.

I looked at myself in the mirror, seeing the two red eyes staring back at me from the mirror. Kakashi was right, they were different, a lot different. Mangekyou Sharingan, my eyes evolved to Mangekyou. At that moment, I didn't know if I should be laughing or crying. It was stupid, that whoever was in charge of this world was rewarding me for the deaths I had witnessed. Were they pitying me for the trauma I had to endure? Was this how Itachi felt when he activated his Mangekyou from Shisui's death, the pathetic power that fed on sadness and heartbreak? _This is so wrong. This world is so wrong._

I looked at my eyes closer, the backgrounds were still red, but instead of the wheel and the three tomoes in each eye, there was a three-petaled flower in each of my eyes with black shadows trailing behind each petal. I noticed that my left eye was missing one of the red and black petals, so instead, it was left with two petals and three shadows. I pushed the bathroom door open and looked at the only other sharingan user in the room with confusion and anger.

"What the hell is this?" I demanded, desperately looking for something else to think. However, Kakashi seemed to reluctant to answer that.

"It's your mangekyou sharingan, I guess it would be strange if you didn't activate it." Kakashi explained quietly and I shook my head at him.

"Sorry, I didn't explain clearly, I know this is mangekyou sharingan, I want to know what the hell happened to my left eye and why the hell did one of the petals, or designs, or whatever, disappear." I asked again. Another mystery, I hated mysteries.

"I don't know, I'm not supposed to be an expert at this. But my best guess would be, you used your left eye's ability, and that cost you one of the petals." Kakashi answered uncertainly, and I pounded my head, trying to remember what the hell did I do. There was the black fire, and then somehow the time stopped. THE TIME STOPPED.

"Oh shit, I probably did." I said to Kakashi, "Will the petal come back? Or do I only get three tries? Then my eyes go what, back to the original sharingan, or will it go blind?" I shot out the questions like bullets, knowing my temporary instructor was probably sighing behind his mask. _Come on, focus on something else other than the blood, the blade, the bodies._

"I don't know, maybe it will come back, maybe not. Just calm down for the moment, the information about the abilities will probably come to you. It's your eyes after all." He said to me while shaking his head and I did try to pull out information from my mind. He was right, it's supposed to be my eyes, I am supposed to have control over it. Although overuse of the Mangekyou Sharingan would definitely result in blindness, I did not want to go blind early just because I wasn't sure how to use it. There was a click or something in my subconscious, and then there was some vague information flooding my mind. My right eye had a different ability than the right, I almost choked when I realized, it was Amaterasu, the same kind Itachi had. _Genes, heritage. The cruelest reminder._ As for my left eye…

"Kannon Bosatsu" I whispered its name, the ability that resides in my left eye. The good news was the petal will come back after all, so I have more than three tries in my lifetime before I become blind. The bad news was, it will take at least thirty days for one petal to grow back, and if I happened to use all three of them, then my left eye would be temporarily blind for a while until one petal could grow back. The easier version of its ability would be 'to stop the flow and consequence of time in a set cubic region', how long I could hold it would be depending on the area of the cubic region, my chakra level and the chakra level inside of the region.

I almost laughed because of the irony. I wanted to stop Itachi so I could catch him, but when I actually stopped him, I failed to reach him. _Cruel, cruel, cruel. Everything was so cruel. Why give me a power when all I can do is fail? Kami, someone, please tell me why!_

The amount of chakra and attention needed to activate this skill was insane, that's why my physical body was weak and vulnerable during its activation. It was a miracle that I actually moved last time with a number of injuries on me, and that meant it would probably take more than thirty days for me to regain that petal.

"By your expression, I take it that you already found that out?" Kakashi asked as I was opened my eyes again. I felt the chakra retreating and stopped feeding my eyes, and the mangekyou sharingan finally faded away.

"Yes." I answered briefly, not feeling like elaborating on the topic, and Kakashi did not pursue it.

"Hokage-sama would probably want to talk to you soon, so think about what you are going to do. Like it or not, you are the oldest Uchiha in the village, and it's your responsibility now." Kakashi warned me, and I didn't answer him. After a moment of silence, he disappeared, leaving me alone to think about the mystery I wanted to unravel, the answers I wanted to obtain and the conclusion I wanted to reach.

 _He is right, only two Uchihas are left and one of them is in a coma. Maybe if I were on my own, I wouldn't care about what kind of rotting death I receive. But, Sasuke is still here. He is still here. If the sky were to fall down, then someone needs to hold it up. I am willing to do that for him._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"I'm sorry, Akira-shishou." That was the first thing I said to my shishou the next morning. Even after all those years of reading his expression, at this moment, I realized that I couldn't read him.

"I've been thinking about what I want to do, now that this happened. There is something I want to know, and there is someone I want to find or kill, depends on that answer. In order to do that, I need to be in Anbu." I explained calmly. I articulated each word slowly as if I had to think about each word over and over again to make sure of what I meant.

There was a momentary silence before he spoke up: "You probably thought it through yourself, already. If you want to hunt down that person, then Anbu is your best choice. However, you seemed to reject the idea of Anbu just three years ago, I originally thought it was mostly because of Daichi's death, but now I don't think that's all. I am your teacher, your Shishou, I don't want to hinder your freedom, but I can't let you walk towards a hell hole."

I took a breath, this was more of a convincing myself rather than convincing my teacher. I closed my eyes for a second and let out the words: "I didn't want to go to Anbu when my father forced me to because of some stupid personal fear. I didn't like the fact that I don't have control over my life, but now I realize, I never did and I never will, not until I find my answer." Whether I liked it or not, I was essentially trapped. There was no way I could have lived my life normally unless I was able to find that answer. Itachi owned me that answer, and I owned it to Sasuke.

"I am confused, really confused. It's like I am in the middle of some complicated mystery where everyone else knows what the hell is going on except for me. And Itachi, that little freaking… left me behind like some idiot running in circles. Sasuke, he is the truly unfortunate one, but he shouldn't be the one to take that responsibility. The chances are, no matter what answers I gain, it won't change the fact that Itachi killed my parents, Sasuke's dear mom and dad. Sasuke will want to kill him no matter what like an idiot chasing with tunnel vision. That's fine, I want to hunt him down and get my answer then I will kill him, then Sasuke will get his revenge and the Uchiha name will be cleared like Sasuke wanted." I said like it was someone else's business as if I didn't just talk about killing my own brother. I could almost remember my past identity, the name known as 'Artemis'. _However, do I really want to kill him? I don't know, I really don't. I am still confused, so confused, but at least I am trying to take the first step._

"You sounds like you are doing a lot of things you don't want, Anbu never forces people to join, not if they don't want to." Akira-shishou narrowed his eyes at me, but I stared back fearlessly.

"You once asked team 6 what our dreams are. I couldn't give you a definite answer, This time, I could tell you, my dream is to get that answer, preferably before it drives me crazy. Whatever stupid thing Sasuke wants to do, I will do it for him. Just like how Itachi did it for me once, he said it was his freedom to choose when I was stuck. It's my own freedom to choose to take on Sasuke's burden when he thinks that's the only thing he could do." I placed my hand on my heart to show my determination. We Uchihas are stupid, we are stupid for love and we are stupid for hate. I thought once that I was immune to that stupidity, but now I see that it's contagious, from Shisui to Itachi to Sasuke and now to me.

Anbu, I supposed for me, it was the codename for the abyss I didn't want to fall into again. But I was willing to enter it again in order to find what I needed. _What happened in there, Itachi? What changed you? What did you have to go through?_ I wanted to know what my brother went through and I wanted to know how far behind was my ability when compared to his. _You said I wouldn't understand, you said I shouldn't even try. But I want to know, I want to see for myself what you had to go through. I want to know what I missed when I cowardly ran away._

"You are pushing it a little here, Maiko. Placing your dream on such a singular thing, what will you do when you found that answer?"

"It's not an easy answer to get, Shishou, I will probably spend my life on it, or I may never succeed. Itachi could kill me before I get the answer out of him, I have never won against him before. But I do want to leave everything to Sasuke when it's all over, I think I deserved that much. I will spend the rest of my life serving Konoha as a kunoichi if I live. Do I have to find another dream afterward?" I asked rhetorically and this time, Akira-shishou stayed silent.

"Anbu will get me what I want, at least, the fastest way. Itachi is now an S-rank missing-nin, and thus his continuous search will fall into the hands of high-rank Anbu teams. Anbu will not only give me direct access to Itachi's hunting mission, I also have a feeling that there will be some answers in Anbu as well. There is something one can only find when they are in there themselves." I was taking a risk here, if the wrong person heard this, they could very well say that I was abusing the Konoha system for my own selfish gain, and in a way that's true.

"Very well, I understand your reasons. You will always be one of my best students. Hard working, talented, but sometimes very annoying with your little smart habits. Promise me you will practice the kenjutsu hard." Akira-shishou finally said, there was a certain sadness in his voice, but he still managed to ruffle my hair with a smile.

"Of course, I could never be grateful enough for all the time you trained me, all the things you did for me. You will always be my Shishou, my first and only Shishou." I exclaimed and I meant it. I was starting a new path, changing my goals and changing my life. I stood up and gave my master a deep bow, and I didn't raise my head until he pulled me up.

"You know what, as a parting gift, I'll give you the permission to call yourself the apprentice of Shinbara Akira, just don't ruin my family name."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

Just like Kakashi warned me, I was indeed summoned by the Sandaime Hokage-sama a few weeks after I woke up from the coma. I was led and escorted to the Hokage's tower by some Anbu, but when I arrived, I wasn't sent to his office, but rather, I was taken into a large conference room, where dozens of eyes were on me.

"Hokage-sama. Respectful Councilmen and Clan Leaders." I bowed to the observers in the room, I'd be stupid if I couldn't recognize the stoic man with the byakugan as Hyūga Hiashi; or the blond haired man as Yamanaka Inoichi; or the one eyed old man covered in bandages as Shimura Danzō, one of the most powerful councilmen.

Shisui once warned me to be careful of that man, he told me: "Shimura Danzō is the kind of person that hides in the dark, but you should never underestimate the influence he exerts on Konoha. Stay away from the council, especially Shimura Danzō, if you don't want to get caught up by a bunch of political bull crap." I could understand why now, Danzō gave off of a dangerous aura, he was calculating, and he could get what he wanted just by patiently waiting for his prey to fall into the trap. He was a spider, weaving his webs from the dark, catching all insects alike.

"Welcome, Maiko-chan, sorry to drag you out of the hospital when you are still recovering from your… traumas." Hokage-sama said to me in a kind voice, he soon continued explaining: "There are just of few more things we need clarification and we need to discuss your future as well as your brother's." I nodded and waited patiently for the questions. The Hokage signed at the man beside him, who had the typical Nara spiky ponytail and two scars across his face. No doubt, he must be Nara Shikaku, the Jonin Commander.

"Can you confirm that Uchiha Itachi was the one responsible for the massacre?" Commander Nara asked.

"I saw him killing my parents. I never actually saw him killing others, but he was the only one there." I answered honestly and there was a buzzing silence to the room. Of course the councilmen and clan leaders already knew who was responsible, or otherwise, they wouldn't declare Itachi a missing-nin so soon.

"Did he expressed why he committed the atrocity." the Jonin Commander asked again.

' _Hell if I know, but that's what I'm trying to figure out.'_ was what I wanted to say, but instead, I said: "He said he was cleansing the clan." _What a load of crap, I don't believe for a second that this was his reason._ There was a slight round of murmur going around the conference room, but they subsided when the Hokage-sama cleared his throat.

"Thank you Maiko-chan, I know it must be hard for you, but we just need to talk about the future of the Uchiha clan." The Hokage said to me.

"There is nothing to discuss, the Uchiha clan is no more, there are only two children left. They should be adopted by other Clans until they are of age." Danzō spoke in a deep voice, and I found myself irritated by this voice. _How dare he, deciding our future for us?_

"Danzō, that's not a fixed matter yet, I would like to speak with Maiko-chan first." Hokage-sama hushed Danzō before he turned to me, giving me permission to speak.

"Forgive me Elder Danzō, but I believe I'm not a child anymore, I have been a Chunin for three years now, and I can take care of my brother until he is of age. There is no need for us to be adopted." I responded with determination. There was no way I would let some random stranger have control over our lives.

"What about the Uchiha compound, even if we recognize you as an independent Clan head, I don't believe you have the financial means to pay taxes to keep your compound. If that's the case, then Konoha will take back the land given to your clan as public properties." I didn't really react when I heard Danzō's words. The compound didn't mean that much for me anyway, but I guess it would be unfair for Sasuke to get his home taken away. However, before I could even decide how to respond, another voice spoke up before I did.

"I'm sorry, Hokage-sama, but I can not entertain the idea that if something horrible were to happen to my clan, that the compound and the land will be taken away from my children when they are the only survivors. We pay tribute to the village both through service and financial means, but that should not be taken as taxes for the land we were given since the founding of Konoha." Hyūga Hiashi said in a clear voice, and his speech gained him many sounds of approval from the nearby clan leaders.

"I'm afraid that Hyūga-san is right, Danzō. The Uchiha children have the right to the compound." Hokage-sama declared as I watched this drama unfold in front of me.

"Fine, but the Konoha Police Station is a public building owned by the village. Seeing that the Uchiha clan do not have the means to run it, it will be returned to the village as public projects." Danzō said unwillingly, but the expression from the Hokage sealed the deal.

"This is settled then. Uchiha Maiko and Uchiha Sasuke will be given the ownership of the Uchiha compound and Uchiha Maiko will be given the custody of herself and her brother until he is of age. Meeting adjourned." Hokage-sama declared loudly. The various members bowed and then left. I watched the last bits of the conversation passively like it was anybody else's business but mine. The compound was just a place, a place filled with bad memories, but I'll be damned before letting some other clan elders control Sasuke's life and mine.

To my surprise, I was not escorted back to the hospital, instead, the small team of Anbu sent me waiting outside of the Hokage's office. I waited for perhaps ten minutes before there was a small voice calling me to come in.

I entered the room and saw the familiar image of Hokage-sama sitting behind his office desk, with his Jonin Commander standing beside him. It was an image right from my memory since I haven't been summoned to the Hokage's room since Daichi's death.

"Ah, Maiko-chan, sorry for the wait. But there's something I'd like to discuss with you alone, it's about your choice of future career." Sandaime Hokage-sama said to me gently. I stayed silent, already knowing what he would be talking to me.

"I heard from Jonin Shinbara that you would like to serve in Anbu." He stated, and there was silence. I nodded once and then I looked up, seeing Hokage-sama's hard eyes on me.

"To be honest, I have no qualms with that. Your skill level is exceptional with your age, and if Jonin Shinbara had not convinced me to place you under his apprenticeship, I would have tried to recruit you. However, with your brother's incident, I am not sure it's a good idea for you to join Anbu. Please, state your reason, I need to know if you will be stable enough to work in that environment." the Hokage said calmly; unlike his usual gentle voice, there were no emotions colouring his words.

"I've thought about a lot of things after my brother murdered my family. The reason I want to be Anbu is to find a conclusion, for both me and Sasuke. At this moment, I feel like that's the drive in my life, the motivation that keeps me from dropping to the ground. I want to hunt him down, and that's basically my reason in life right now. I've been running away from what I should be doing for long enough. Last time, Itachi took my place in Anbu so I could be free. This time, let me take my brother's place in revenge." There were a few truths and a few lies in that speech, but mostly they were truth. I didn't tell him my own uncertainty towards how to deal with my brother. I didn't tell him that I wanted to poke around Anbu for answers that may or may not be there, that's something I'd like to keep to myself.

The Hokage stayed silent for a moment before he spoke up: "Very well. I will issue your transfer into Anbu, However, I do expect you to know that the environment in Anbu is harsh and dark. So if there is any sign that you are not suitable, I will pull you out of there and place you back into the normal shinobi force or even force you to retire. Do you understand the risk you are taking?"

"Yes." I answered clearly.

"I see that your hospital report say that you are well recovered for missions, and you have already asked for a psych evaluation from Inoichi-san. It's stated that both your mental and physical trauma are well managed and there seem to be no long-lasting effects." It's quite easy to hide the potential effect of an emotional break down when you know how. I was sure the Hokage knew that, but he didn't argue with the report.

"Take today off, I would like to place you into Anbu training as soon as possible if that's okay. I really don't like to drag out the transfer order to Anbu since they are supposed to be as secretive as possible. You will be starting your training tomorrow, take the rest of the day to take care of things. I trust you know what to say and what not to say." Hokage-sama stated as he drafted something down on the table and handed it to his Jonin Commander.

"Yes. Thank you Hokage-sama" I answered again.

"Don't thank me yet, at least not until you know what Anbu is really like."

 _Trust me, I know what I'm getting into, more than you think._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I stood by Sasuke's bed, watching him sleep quietly. It's already been ten days, yet he still hadn't woke up. I should be getting worried, really worried, but I had a feeling that he will wake soon, but I probably won't be able to be by his side when that happens.

"So are you leaving soon?" I heard Shun entering the room and stand beside me.

"You are not going to ask where?" I responded with a question.

"You are forgetting my skills, I know things, well, most things." He teased.

"Right, even things you shouldn't be knowing. I'm leaving tomorrow morning." I said, there was an awkward silence before I continued, "When Sasuke wakes up and is ready to be discharged, would you take him to my room in the apartment? I might not have time to do that."

"I'm hurt you have to ask. Of course, I'll take him back to your room. What about you? Where are you going to stay now?" He faked a hurt expression as he asked.

"I have places I can crash, I'm not that picky. I'll come back when I can, but Sasuke is going to be… difficult. I know you don't like difficult stuff, like emotional baggage and children. But please, if you can, help him a little so he doesn't do something stupid when I'm not there." I said quietly as I gently stroke Sasuke's hair. His hair was so unruly, so unlike Itachi's or mine.

"Noted. I can still expect your part of the rent, right? Cause I'm not nice enough to pay for a kid when his sister is clearly around somewhere."

"You and your money. To be fair, the whole Uchiha estate and inheritance is Sasuke's now, so I really doubt you have to worry about money." I laughed a bit. This was a hard time, for both Sasuke and me, and being the horrible sister I was, I chose to leave him in order to do something I desired. This sounded familiar, right, I was doing exactly what Itachi did three years back. So much for having a valid reason, now I felt like a hypocrite.

"People don't survive on kindness you know. I didn't survive this long using the orphan kid card. Anyway, I'll take care of your little brother. But please, come back often; I'm not a qualified psychiatrist yet, but even I know he doesn't need a random person giving him a place to stay, he needs his sister." Shun said as he left the room, leaving me and Sasuke alone.

After I stared at my brother's unresponsive sleeping form for a while, I went back to the apartment. There were a few things I needed to get ready for.

Despite living in here for almost three years, I really only had a few things in my room. The room was mostly empty; there were maybe three photos on the wall of me, Akira-shishou, Shun, Sasuke, Itachi, and Shisui. The only pieces of furniture in the room were my bed, a table, and a chair.

The first thing I did was to take any photo with Itachi in it off of the wall, which wasn't much anyway. Sasuke would be living here once he was discharged, and any sign of the traitor he hated so much would have to go away. Next, I went to open the drawers under the table, pulling out the weapon pouch, my headband and some spare changes of clothes. Along with the necklace bag that I really didn't want to see, I threw them all into a backpack and put it down on my bed, besides my two swords.

"Please don't hover by the window, Kakashi-sensei, it's really weird when you do that." I said with a sigh, then like a puff of wind, the silver-haired Anbu appeared. It's kind of disappointing when you know that the traps you set up don't do shit against stronger shinobis, but that was not the point right now.

"Going somewhere?" He asked nonchalantly, still holding his 18+ romantic novel open.

"Not far, just going to find my answer, like you told me to." I answered and proceeded to sit on the chair.

"I never told you anything. But I take it you don't need my unreliable instructions on ninjutsu anymore. Shame, your Chidori training was going so well."

"Sure you didn't. But probably not, you never know, I might be able to finish your Chidori on my own. I got a streak going with the punching a hole in stones." I was a bit disappointed that I won't be able to finish learning the Chidori. Considering I'd only started that a few months ago, and Kakashi only allowed me to practice it when he was there, which was like thirty minutes per week, I'd take being able to pierce a small hole in the stone a success.

"Don't go trying that stuff yourself and burn your arm off like the last time." He warned me, but with the mask and the book, I wasn't sure if he was serious or not.

"For the last time, that was not intentional, I never planned on trying your Chidori anyway, but circumstances dictated that I do something before I get turned into a human puppet." Of course, Kakashi was gone before I finished my rant.

When I got sent to the underground training facility for Anbu recruits next morning, I found myself stood in a line of other recruits, some looked like teenagers, some looked older. It was hard to tell when all of us were dressed in the same black training gears and wearing the same blank training masks.

The trainer was dressed in the usual Anbu gears with a black undershirt, gray jacket vest, and a turtle mask. He shouted to us loudly while pacing in front of us: "From now on, you will be conditioned first in general physical requirements before you will be assigned into teams which will further mentor you in different areas of your specialties. This training will last for a month, anyone not fit will be cut off. Remember that you chose this, recruits, you chose to be in in the Special Assassination and Tactical Squad. Your loyalty will always be directed to the Current Hokage of Konohagakure, never anyone else."

 _I am back, back to my designed destiny, it's like a revolving planet, no matter how far I tried to run, I was still pulled back by the gravity. After twelve years of a second chance, I am back here again, as a recruit trained for dark operations that are too much for the public eyes._

 _Except for this time, I am aiming for something. Let me see what changed you, let me see your experience. Keep on running Itachi, one day, I will hunt you down, because I'm just vindictive like that._

 _When I do - and it's not an 'if', because I will - you better have a damn good answer for me._

* * *

A/N: so we can see that Maiko is giving Itachi the benefit of doubt, because she couldn't make sense of what see was seeing. She probably came in at the worst moment during the massacre, where everyone is sending her mixed message, and yes, I supposed the theme of this is confusion, she is very indecisive of her actions, the typical 'I am going to take a step in some direction and maybe I'll end up somewhere close.' simply because she doesn't have any better solution.

The update schedule will now go back to every Saturday unless I have another super lazy week like the last one. So stay tuned for Chapter 15, the first chapter of Arc 2 - Anbu (see where I am going with the title, it's really hard to find things that start with A that fits with the theme)


	15. Chapter 15 - Forward

A/N: I have a cover! Even though I draw it in an hour, and it was really simple, I have a cover! Okay, so this is the first chapter of Arc 2, and this arc has to do more with character development than anything. Yes, I know that I left a bunch of mess with the massacre and stuff (both emotionally and physically), so I need to fix it.

On the other hand, thanks to all the reviewers, I read ever single one of them with much happiness. Also, I thank all the guest reviewers as well, even if I can't reply to all of you one by one.

Beta'd by the charming Alice J

* * *

Chapter 15 - Forward

I laid down on the metal bench and let the coldness of the metal overwhelm my body. I almost forgot how tiring and exhausting recruit training could be with twelve years of comfort (in comparison I mean, definitely not missing that three days spent with a psychotic puppeteer).

My training clothes were soaked with sweat, though of course, it's not visible on the black fabric. The blank white mask was still on my face, it was the protocol that all Anbu must keep their masks on at all time until they were dismissed to go home. Technically, as new recruits, we won't be dismissed until the month-long training was over. So we stayed at the training facility, slept on benches for three hours per day, and then trained for the rest of the day.

"Fifteen-minute break is up!" Someone yelled and the whole room full of Anbu recruits lying on benches or floor groaned. I pushed my sore body up from the cold hard bench. I sighed and stood up from the bench, adjusted my black training shirt and made sure the mask was still straight on my face.

I felt something coming at me, without turning, I raised my hand and caught an incoming water bottle. "Thanks." I said briefly and nodded to acknowledge the recruit who threw me a water bottle. He (it's probably a he, his build looked like a male) raised his hand to make a "you're welcome" gesture before continuing to throw water bottles to the rest of the recruits. I wouldn't say we were family-like, or even comrade-like, we were just a bunch of people who were thrown into this training hell hole together.

We got out of the resting room/sleeping area quickly and lined ourselves in front of our supervisor. "Alright, time for another drill, you guys know the routine, now start yourselves on it. Those who finish them will go over to the Taijutsu training area to practice with a dummy. Set them on extra fast mode, work on the speed and the power of your strikes." Despite the groans we all made in the resting area, none of us made a sound and went straight for the drills, laps, jumping, speed and muscle training.

The recruit training, or the thirty-day-hellish-conditioning like some called it, was basically training to increase our general physical conditions. It builds our fitness, strength, endurance and speed, so that when we were assigned to teams later, we could at least follow our senior teammates. It also lets us get used to working with very little sleep, so when we were actually sent on the mission, we won't get killed immediately.

The training was painfully monotonal. We get 20 hours of training every day that's split off into five sections. Each section was four hours then followed by a fifteen minutes break as the other sections began. At the start of each section, we did the general drills to build our fitness first. To say it's hellish is an understatement, its difficulty and tasks also increased as time passed. Recruits usually finished them in two to two and a half hours, then we worked on different aspects of close combat. Taijutsu, speed, evasion, or sometimes, just pure strength. This part was mostly self-directed, we trained in our own methods, and the supervisor gave us advice and lessons as he walked by. I still remembered the first words Turtle gave me: "Your hit power sucks."

We had assessments every day in different formats such as sparring with others or with dummies, timed runs, and evasion. Those who didn't reach the standard or didn't perform well enough was withdrawn from the training. Only those who survived the thirty-day training get to be placed in actual Anbu forces. I got into my old rhythm in OLYMPUS when it was the fifth day or so, letting the familiar environment settle around me.

This was our last day of the training, the fifth section to be exact. All of us who were still here were the ones that adapted and survived. By the time two hours had passed, all of us were furiously beating down our dummies like bags of potatoes, and I was sure it had nothing to do with our pent up frustrations or anything. Oh boy, we really weren't holding anything back, I was sure we destroyed dozens of dummies, because it would really suck if we got eliminated at the last moment.

The clock struck twelve and today's training was over. We gathered around Turtle for the debrief before whatever happens next. Usually, we would go to sleep quietly, with no extra energy left to spare. However, today was different, we should be jumping in excitement, but we all learned that if you made sounds when you shouldn't, you get an extra set of drills.

"Congratulation, or something like that. All of you survived the recruit training, but rest assured, that was only beginner stuff. Next, you will be placed into teams, and your team captain will assign your mentors for your specialization training. You have… let's say eight hours until you have to be back here in full gears." Turtle said in a casual voice. Don't get fooled by his casual choice of words, when he said eight hours, he actually meant seven hours thirty minutes.

Our supervisor then proceeded to hand out our gears, I wasn't sure how he differentiated us from each other, but somehow he did. Each of us got our unique masks and the standard Anbu gear in our size. I stared down at my assigned animal mask, and thought "Really?" It was a rabbit. Two small ears stuck out from the top, and the eyeholes were circled in red paint with three red strokes on each cheek for the whiskers.

"Dismissed! Come back on time, I meant it." No one would ever think that he didn't mean it. I didn't stand around dazed or drop on the ground because of extreme tiredness, instead, I quickly took a shower in the locker room and changed out of my black training clothes for a normal shirt and normal pants. Compared to my body a month ago, I gained more lean muscle, as well as a few more bruises. Yep, I was definitely coddled by Akira-shishou. I pulled out my bag, which I hadn't touched for a month, and stuffed the Anbu gears in along with the rest of my possessions. I left before my hair was even dried. I had a visit that's long overdue.

I ran across the midnight streets until I arrived at the place I called home for three years, yet I didn't return for one month. I fumbled through my backpack and pulled out the old keys. The door opened, and to my surprise, Shun and Sasuke were sitting by the same old table, drinking tea.

"Welcome back, the person who lost her room a month ago." Like always, Shun just had to make an unnecessary remark; it was like time never passed.

"It's twelve at night, why are you guys still awake? More importantly, why is Sasuke still awake?" I asked with disbelief. I could survive with three hours of sleep every day, but Sasuke couldn't, his body was still growing.

"I'm not a child anymore. Besides, it's not like you care." Sasuke spat at me angrily, then he slammed the teacup down on the table before stomped towards my - his room.

"Bad day?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Bad month." Shun answered and started to clean the spill Sasuke made. I muttered a "sorry" quickly before following my temperamental little brother. I twisted the doorknob and entered my old room. Sasuke was hiding in the bed, using the blanket as a cover, he buried himself.

I walked towards him quietly and proceeded to sat on the bed, I said to him gently: "Still mad at me, Otouto?" There was a momentary silence before I heard a small, muffled voice.

"Shun-nii-san said that you are doing something important, that's why you won't be home a lot of times. Is that true?" Sasuke asked.

"Yes, something very important." I answered ambiguously.

"Are you going to kill Nii-san?" There was a pause.

"Do you want him dead?"

"Yes."

"Do you want to kill him yourself?" Another pause.

"Yes."

"Then yeah, I am going to kill him." I said as Sasuke slowly sat up.

"But I want to kill him myself, I want to be the one taking revenge." He said with his childish voice, and that made me want to cry and laugh at the same time.

"Won't it be the same if I kill him?" I asked the stupid question, already knowing the answer. Sasuke immediately shook his head.

"You don't understand, Nee-chan. I saw everything, how that…monster killed everyone in cold blood. I want to kill him with my own hands." _Oh, little brother, I probably saw more than what he was willing to show you._

"I'll kill him. I'll kill him before you do. If I fail, you can finish the job." I said to him, ruffling Sasuke's hair. I wanted to pass this as a joke, maybe he'd believe it was a joke. He didn't.

"Don't say that. You are the only one left. I will protect you from him." Sasuke yelled at me before he fell back to the bed. He turned away from me and tucked his head back into the cover. I sighed quietly, and then I uncovered the blanket and let myself into the bed. I hugged Sasuke from behind, and that just earned me an angry grunt.

"Stop that! Mai-nee-chan! I'm not a child anymore!"

"Well, you are to me right now. Go to sleep, Sasuke, you are tired, and I'm tired as well." I said with an annoyed tone. When Sasuke went quiet, I continued, "Five years, Sasuke. Give me five years to figure things out and take care of things, that's all I'm asking."

"What happens after that? What if nothing changes in five years? What if there is nothing to figure out?" Sasuke questioned in his angry little voice. _Do you really believe that, little brother? Do you really believe that what you see is all there is?_ I supposed that he didn't have a choice, with how little things he could believe in.

"We will figure it out after five years, when our heads are clearer and when our powers are greater. Have some faith in me. All I'm asking is that you wait for five years in the village and don't do stupid things. Can you do that for me?" Once again, I asked the child in my arms. This time, he didn't speak up immediately. After an excruciatingly long period of silence, I felt the ruffling of his unruly hairs as he nodded.

It wasn't long before he fell asleep and I felt his rhythmic breathing. Sasuke needed a mother figure, someone that can be with him, someone like mom. I was not that figure.

However, there were things that only I could do. _I'll definitely find him, Sasuke, I'll find him and get our answer, and then… I'll figure out what to do when I hit that point. Now that the bridge behind us is burned, the only way is to move forward._ Soon after that, I drifted to sleep as well.

I woke up three hours later, and I blamed the training for that. I left Sasuke to continue sleeping and I walked out of the room. I found Shun still sitting by the table, looking through the piles of paperwork on his desk, even though it's almost three thirty in the morning.

"Why are you still up? It's really late." I said to him and sat myself down by the table.

"First of all, I wasn't planning on sleeping today seeing the stacks of intelligence reports I have to go through. Your brother was just trying to stubbornly show that he can be adult-like too. Secondly, I figure I won't get to talk to you soon if I missed this chance. You doing well?" He asked.

"As well as I can be with three hours of sleep every day. I'm sorry if Sasuke is giving you so much trouble, I wasn't allowed to come back before, but now, I can, even though it's probably not a lot of time anyway." I felt really bad for leaving Sasuke with Shun, it seemed like every time I got a problem, I'd dump it on him. And being the gentle friend he was, he would never say no.

"He is really troublesome, but I guess it couldn't be helped. I was going to leave him in the Yamanaka household when I had to be on the job, but he'd just run back anyway, something about the Yamanaka heiress being an annoying fangirl." Shun joked and I laughed.

"I assume he is not going to the Academy? I'll get him to go, so you don't have to deal with him." I said as I fiddled with the teacup.

"He will be going next week anyway, he said he will go back." There was an awkward silence in the room.

"Are you regretting your decision?" He asked me slowly. Another silence.

"No, I still stand by it."

"Then that's all that mattered. Sasuke will be fine. He is young, so he is not easily adjusted. But he will be fine. A little twisted and emotionally broken, maybe, but he will be fine."

"... Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

"No, I'm just telling the truth from a psychiatrist's point of view."

"You are not even a psychiatrist!" The conversation continued for about fifteen minutes before I decided to leave and give Shun some time to rest.

I walked along the training grounds, unsure of what to do for the next four hours or so. I was sure that I didn't want to do any of that hellish training again, but now that it's done, I felt… empty, like I didn't know what to do. Sasuke was in emotional turmoil, Shun was busy keeping his life and his promise to me in balance, and I was… I supposed the closest thing was making a five-year-plan for the future. _Forward. We are all marching forward. As ironic as it sounds, there is no repeat button this time. Just so we don't get lost, we need to march forward._

I sat down in one of the benches near the training grounds with my bags. When I was sure there was no one around, I pulled out the mask from my bag and started to study it. There wasn't anything special with the mask. It's a codename, a hidden identity, I'd done it enough times. I was Operative 31, and then I was 'Artemis'. In between, I became others, and now, I am Uchiha Maiko, and I will soon be Rabbit.

I felt a wind rustling, and as a reflex, I quickly pushed the mask away into my bag. There was another rustling of the wind, and then Kakashi-sensei was sitting beside me.

"Geez, you scared me. What the hell?" I asked after letting out a breath. I didn't know if he saw the mask or not, but I guess it didn't matter. He was in Anbu, and Anbu didn't judge each other.

"I don't know, I was just strolling while reading my book. Why are you here, kids shouldn't be out this late." He answered while reading his favorite 18+ book.

"That doesn't apply to me anymore. I had my share of the sleep today." Three hours seemed to be all I need now, even if I tried to fall asleep after that, I couldn't.

"Thirty-days-hellish-conditioning? Yeah, it has that side effect." I shouldn't be surprised that he knew, he probably saw the rabbit mask earlier. I tried to close my eyes under the slightly chilling breeze, but after one minute, my brain was overwhelmed with the desire to do something, so much that I opened my eyes and shook my head.

"Yeah, couldn't do it. I kept on thinking that I am late for my first morning session." I sighed, realizing how ridiculous I sound.

"How long do you have before you have to leave?" Kakashi asked me. I looked at the watch in my backpack, it said 4:25. I answered after a pause, "Three hours." deciding that I should probably arrive at 7:30 instead of eight.

"Come on, I'll introduce you to someone." He stood up and started walking. I followed him confusedly and asked: "It's the middle of the night, who's up this late?" He didn't answer me, so I just followed him blindly.

When we arrived at an apartment building, I realized that there were indeed people awake at this time of the day, because the room was clearly lit up. Kakashi didn't knock on the door, instead, he jumped up to the railing and got in through the window. My mind was racing through a thousand possibility of traps that Kakashi could get by but I couldn't. I sighed and jumped up to follow him.

When I got in through the trap-less window, I heard a loud war cry "My rival! You are here! Shall we have a match?!" I saw a man dressed in a green jumpsuit with orange leg warmers, he was doing push-ups furiously with one finger. I wasn't sure I was seeing this right, so I blinked, but the image was the same, and the man seemed to notice me.

"Ah, Kakashi, you brought a youth! I see, you want to introduce this flower of springtime what youth is all about! You came to the right person! Let's exercise, a thousand push ups starts now!" Then he proceeded to switch his hands and started to do his push-ups.

"Maiko, this is Maito Gai, the best taijutsu specialist and one of the Jonin in Konoha. Gai, this is Uchiha Maiko, she couldn't sleep because she wanted to do some training." I attempted to kick Kakashi, but he dodged quickly. He was twisting my words, I did not ask for this. At. All.

"That is the spirit of youth! Maiko-chan! We shall train extra hard just for you today!" I took a step back, as Maito Gai increased his tempo by two times. "I take it back, I want to sleep." I whispered to Kakashi, but he just shook his head at me "Too late, just accept this." I glared at him again, he ignored me.

Thankfully, Gai did not force me to do the push ups with him, so I just watched in the sideline with Kakashi. It was kind of funny and amazing how this guy could do so many push ups so fast while still be able to shout encouraging words at me or war cries at Kakashi.

It was kind of entertaining and interesting, so I stayed and watched the furious training display Gai did until seven twenty. Then I said goodbye to Gai, and Kakashi was already gone like usual. Quickly, I gathered my bags and ran for the Anbu operation center, it's time to begin a new identity.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

When I finished changing into Anbu gears and put the mask on, it was exactly seven thirty. I wasn't surprised to see all the other recruits were also there, completely ready. We lined up in front of our supervisor, Turtle, and he seemed satisfied that all his training finally cracked through to us.

"Glad to see all of you knew what I meant. First order of business, the tattoo." Turtle motioned toward his right shoulder, showing us a black spiral tattoo that resembled the Konoha leaf symbol. This was our symbol, a permanent mark on our bodies, and it also served as an emergency communication service between the Hokage and us if necessary.

Turtle walked to us one by one with a stack of seals, and he placed a paper seal containing the tattoo on our chosen shoulder. When it was my turn, I motioned to my right shoulder, and he placed the paper seal on it. There was a short searing pain, and then the pain faded little by little. After ten seconds, Turtle ripped the paper off, leaving a black Anbu tattoo on my shoulder. It flared red once, showing the tattoo was working, and then it turned back to black.

"Now for your team assignment. Listen carefully, I will call your codename, which is what you will be referred to for the rest of your duration in Anbu, and then I will tell you your team and their assignment locker. Go meet them when I am done and follow the directions of your Team Captain." He said clearly, and after a slight pause, he proceeded to read out our assignments and I listened closely.

"... Rabbit, you are with Team Ro, locker room 15… That's all, now disperse." Immediately, all the recruits left for their respective locker rooms. I quickly moved towards my own assignment, it wasn't far. When I arrived at the door that said 15, I knocked lightly. There was a silence before I heard a voice saying "Come in". I opened the door and let myself in quietly, then I bowed to my seniors and soon to be teammates.

"I'm the new recruit that is assigned to Team Ro. Please take care of me!" I greeted them using standard phrases. For a second, I didn't hear any responses, but then they started to chatter.

"A new recruit? Are we supposed to get one?" A male voice asked.

"Are you not listening earlier, we are getting one to replace the one we lost." A slightly more feminine answered.

"But getting a rookie? The rookie did go through the recruit training right?" Another male voice asked.

"Quiet, everyone." Suddenly, I heard a familiar voice, but the possibility was a bit wild for it to actually happen. It couldn't be…

"You can raise your head now, Rabbit." The same voice told me, and I straightened my body. I saw the one who spoke, and he was wearing a Hound mask. Yep, the voice, the mask and the body structure all matched. I was placed on Hatake Kakashi's team. We stared at each other for a moment, there was no doubt, he knew my rabbit mask, and he knew that I knew his hound mask.

 _You have got to be kidding me._

Somebody screwed me over, and that's probably the Sandaime Hokage. Most likely, he placed me on Kakashi's team so that a) He can keep an eye on me so I don't turn into another Itachi with massacre tendencies, b) Someone can teach my sharingans and if circumstances dictates, counter my sharingans. _Thanks, Hokage-sama, so much for my career in anonymity._ I supposed that this was the reassurance Hokage-sama had when he agreed to place me in Anbu. I was a factor of uncertainty, not so really so in terms of mental stability. They were more worried about what I was going to do now since my psych report came back clean. What better way to do so than to place me in a very organized and supervised division with mandatory evaluations every month? Compared to the normal shinobi force, I would have less freedom on my parts and a lot more supervision. However, I was fine with that. I wasn't expecting the price to be free anyway. _Well played, Hokage-sama, or should I thank the Jonin Commander as well?_

"Welcome to Team Ro, I am Hound, your Captain. Meet your teammates, Bear, Otter, Zebra and Falcon." He signaled to other members and I heard a bunch of responses including "Welcome", "Hello", and "Yo". From my point of view, Bear, Zebra, and Falcon looked clearly male, and Otter, with her body curves and long purple hair, definitely looked like a female.

"We are going to have to cut the meeting short, Team Ro will immediately have a mission assignment, and so we should be leaving around… now." Hound said, "We'll continue with the introduction and general stuff when we get back, so for now, Rabbit, try to keep up." Just like that, the team members rushed for the door and I followed without a complaint.

Once we were out of the Anbu Facility, they started to run like mad. For once, I was actually thankful for the drills we did in recruit training, but still, I was barely keeping up, and I had a feeling that Hound was lowering their normal speed. They led me to a tunnel outside the village, which I assumed was a secret passageway for Anbu. Once we were out of the village, they switched to tree hopping for traveling methods. I wasn't sure where I was going or what I was supposed to do, but I was vaguely aware of the fact that we are traveling towards the Northwest direction.

"Somebody debrief Rabbit about the mission." I caught Hound's voice ahead and someone immediately tapped my shoulder. I snapped my head towards that direction and I saw Otter motioning the special sign language to inform me about the mission.

' _Target: Shinobi, possibly Iwa missing-nin who were dealing with bandits near Konoha's border. Objective: If confirmed to be Iwa missing-nin, complete elimination of the shinobi as well as the bandits. If target identity unclear, acquire information first, before complete elimination."_ Otter debriefed the mission details quickly before moving away from me and continuing to travel in her previous position. Identification and elimination. Sounds easy enough. Unfortunately, I didn't have all the bingo books memorized, so the identification part was going to be somebody else's job.

It took us exactly one day to travel to the place where the bandit activity was reported. It didn't take too much snooping to get the location of the bandits. All six of us were hiding in the trees. We were far enough that we could get a whole view of their supposed meeting ground, but close enough that the sign language would reach. There was really nothing special about the bandits, they did normal dirty jobs, robbing, thieving, and occasionally murder if a job had gone bad. Usually, that kind of missions would be given to Chunin or Jonin, but if they were consorting with foreign shinobi, it was considered treason and a security breach. This was where we came in.

Quickly, our target shinobi group appeared. There were four of them in total, all dressed in normal civilian clothes. However, I didn't even need the sharingan to see that they were light on their feet, too light for civilians. When I activated the sharingan, I confirmed that they were indeed shinobis, judging from their developed and trained chakra coils.

' _Target confirmed, all Iwa missing-nin from bingo book. Two B-rank and two A-rank. Additional targets were 10 bandits. Proceeds for complete elimination. Bear and I will take the A-ranks, Otter and Falcon take the B-ranks. Rabbit and Zebra will take the bandits."_ I saw Hound signing from the tree across and we all returned the sign for 'clear'. Before we started the raid, Hound signed to us once again ' _stealth elimination required, refrain from flashy and loud techniques unless absolutely necessary.'_ I was pretty sure that last line was directed at me since I was the only rookie here.

The second after Hound gave the 'go' order, we all rushed out of the trees. The bandits were not even alert of what was happening, so I got to cut down two before they even started to panic. The two went down like ragged dolls with one cut across their necks. I infused lightning chakra into the Anbu issued sword so that the wound would be more damaging but there would be less blood spraying around. It was a quick business, but nasty enough. Zebra was also on the roll, a few shuriken to the necks and hearts, and a few slashes across the necks, he was done his half of the job. I was a bit slow in completing my share compared to his since my speed was far from his. Nevertheless, the last two bandits around died of a kunai to the neck and a half cut neck. They were civilians, non-shinobi criminals, but when they decided to consort of foreign missing-nin, they were guaranteed to be eliminated as a whole, and most bandits didn't stand a chance against forces like Anbu.

Zebra was already on his way to help our teammates dealing with Iwa-missing nins. I didn't jump into the battle right away because unlike Zebra, I didn't know how any of them fought. Jumping into the battle would probably just get in their way. Instead, I stayed hidden, letting my sharingan spin furiously, noticing every detail, looking for a chance to strike a hit.

Otter and Falcon were doing well against the B-rank Iwa missing-nins. According to the missing-nins' frantic movements, the battles would be done in a few minutes. It was the A-rank missing-nins who were dragging out the battle, but seeing Bear and Hound's composed movements, the Iwa missing-nins wouldn't stand a chance. Bear had Zebra helping him corner the A-rank so that the missing-nin wouldn't move around so much. I had no doubt that Hound could finish the A-rank missing-nin himself, he was Kakashi of the Sharingan after all, but still, I'd like to look for a chance to help him finish the battle faster. Unlike normal shinobi forces, Anbu didn't have the glory, so no one cared who got the last kill or not. _This reminds me so much of OLYMPUS, and the fact that I am so comfortable with the environment and line of thinking scares me like hell._

The A-rank missing nin created a thick Earth Wall against Hound's lightning jutsu. I guess all the talk about no flashy ninjutsu goes out of the window when your opponent doesn't play by the rules. Hound was using Raiton: Lightning spear, and it was less damaging and less flashy than Chidori. The lightning spear hit the Earth wall and dissipated as the Earth Wall crashed. The A-rank missing-nin took a few step back to avoid being caught up by the residue paralysing electricity left behind, and he was retreating in my direction. I had faith that even if wasn't here, Hound would have caught up with the missing-nin and killed him, it would just take a few steps. But why do that when he can be dead in one step? Kakashi's pride should not be wounded, Anbu marked efficiency, and I was going to make his job easier. With a body flicker, I appeared behind a shocked missing-nin. He noticed me immediately, but his position was too awkward to have an immediate reaction. His hands were in front of him to block the blows from Hound, and his momentum was towards the back. I gathered chakra to enhance the strength of my knee and slammed it into his spine. As I heard the familiar crack and the grunt in pain, I brought my hands up around his neck. Concentrated lightning chakra was crackling on my fingers, when I placed my hands in position around his head, I digged my finger hard into his skin, letting the lightning pulse through his nerves. The Missing-nin paused slightly due to the miniature paralysis, and that was all I needed to twist his head in full force.

There was a really loud crack, signifying his neckbone twisted and broken. I dropped the missing to the ground, with his neck in an unnatural angle. Light cervical fractures could be treated with immediate medical attention and surgery. However, his broken neck was neither light nor did he have any immediate medical attention. He was going to die.

Shortly after I broke his neck, the other missing-nin were more or less dead. Two lost their heads, and the other had multiple… wood spikes… through his chest. Hound signaled 'clean up', and we proceeded to gather bodies. It wasn't hard to gather all the evidence, most deaths were quick, and rarely were there multiple pieces of a body (except for the head). Otter opened a storage seal and proceeded to store all the bodies of the Iwa missing-nin into the scroll. The bodies of the bandits were buried underground with an Earth release, along with the blood and their weapons. When we left, you could barely see the signs of a fight. The ground seemed bare compared to the surrounding, but even if someone were to dig, they would only find the bandit's body, and this would be classified as a paid B-rank mission. No one would know the existence of Iwa missing-nins or Anbu. As far as the world was concerned, we didn't exist.

The returning trip was uneventful. We got back to the village, dropped off the bodies in the intelligence division for examination, debriefed to the Hokage and then we returned to locker room 15. All of us stayed silent, except for Hound, who was our Captain and thus had to deal with the debrief.

"So since the introduction is cut short, let's continue. First of all, this locker room is basically Team Ro's meeting place, we plan the missions here and we rest in here between missions. Bathroom and shower are over there, and your locker to put your personal stuff is here." He motioned one of the metal lockers on the wall and I nodded.

"Your report said that your specialties will be front-line combat and assassination, so you will be trained accordingly." I did not, for a fact picked my specialty, I was sure that the Hokage must have filled it in. Really, Hokage-sama, that was blatant exploitation of the human resource.

"Team Ro is a heavy assault team, so all of us here are specialized in frontline combat. Some of us have a second specialty. Zebra, our combat medic-nin here" Zebra raised a hand, "Falcon, sensor." Falcon nodded. "Otter, tracker and sensor as well." Otter waved at me. "Bear, heavy hitter, infiltration, second in command." Bear nodded slightly. "And me, assassination" Hound finished the round of introduction. I thought about what he said about Zebra being a medic-nin, was he on the team when Hound lead the mission that got Daichi, killed? Maybe, maybe not.

"Ninjutsu and Assassination training with me. Kenjutsu training with Otter. Train other areas by yourself, don't slack behind, I expect you to be able to follow our speed and stealth in a month. This is a dangerous business, Rabbit, you slack, you get killed." Hound summarized quickly, and he looked at Otter, asking for confirmation. Otter nodded and I assumed that meant she was willing to train me.

"Woah, intense training, Captain, you planning on whipping the rookie into another one of…" Falcon started something, but Hound cut him off quickly, "All of you can disperse now until our next mission assignment is here." He was hiding something, I knew that from the bottom of my heart, but I almost smacked myself for immediately jumping to think that it's related to Itachi. He could be hiding a number of things, some of which were really not my business (for example, the porn he deemed to be so precious).

"Not you, Rabbit, your training starts in five minutes at Training ground 37." Just like that, he disappeared from the locker room. I was debating whether I should change or not, since technically when we were not on missions, we were not supposed to wear our Anbu gear outside. But if I change, it would definitely take more than five minutes for me to get there. Then again, it's Kakashi we were talking about, he was _never_ on time, but would that change if he was on Anbu duty?

"Don't bother to change, training ground 37 is very well hidden, lots of Anbu train there anyway." I turned around and realized that it was Zebra who gave me the advice. I gave him my thanks and he just waved it off casually. Quickly I left, if I were to be there in five minutes, I'd better run my ass off to get there.

When I arrived at training ground 37, which is basically a large ravine sheltered by lots of trees, I realized that I put way too much credit on Kakashi. He was late, but only for thirty minutes, so I guess that was an improvement.

"Captain, you are late." I said emotionlessly, trying to keep that annoyance in my tone under control. I still had the rabbit mask on my face and he still had his hound mask on.

"That's unfortunate for you. But I thought you already knew that." I sighed at his words.

After a few second of thoughts, I took the mask off and said: "You are right, this mystery thing doesn't do well between us. I guess I should be thankful that you are only late for thirty minutes, not three hours." After a pause, he took the mask off as well, revealing his usual half hidden face and silver hair.

"Your training will be every day when we don't have a mission. I need to get you up to speed, Team Ro is not for beginners. As per Hokage's request, I will teach you ninjutsu, assassination skills and control over your sharingans and even Mangekyou sharingans." he said calmly, motioning his finger towards my eyes. I guess that training was overdue, I hadn't touched the Mangekyou ever since that time in the hospital.

"Yes, Captain." I answered. There was a moment of silence as I wait for him to say something.

"Zebra was assigned on the team four years ago. I asked for a transfer of Combat Medic-nin to the team." Kakashi suddenly said. I wasn't expecting him to say that, so I wasn't sure how to respond to that. Four years ago was a few months after Daichi's death because of the Kiri-nin, I guess he wanted to reassure me that Anbu didn't ignore my cry for help and that they had been genuinely helpless in that situation. Perhaps it changed my perception of Anbu a bit, but it was too small for me to realize at that moment.

"Okay… but what are we training today?" I asked.

"Thought you might want to work on Chidori since you are so keen to use it when you don't even know how." _I messed up that one time. ONE TIME!_

"... You are never going to let it go, aren't you."

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A/N: So, I can finally start writing fun missions again, and considering Maiko's luck, it would probably be snafu anyway. But yeah, I really try to keep people alive, really. Gai, so I really like him, but I have yet to find a way to put him in, so here is his cameo. So what do you guys think of the cover?

Anyway, the next update is a week from now, on next Saturday.


	16. Chapter 16 - Operation Oolong Tea

A/N: So with this chapter, the word count for the story have officially reached approx. 100,000 words! This section will mostly deal with the 'adventure' tag I put on the story, so yeah for adventures and stuff...

Beta'd by the humorous Alice J, you all should thank her for the title, even though it's completely random and doesn't make sense at first sight, I just can't pass up her suggestion.

* * *

Chapter 16 - Operation Oolong Tea

One month had passed since I entered Team Ro, and I was happy to say that I stopped waking up automatically after three hours of sleep. It had been a running joke in the team ever since they found me waking up in the middle of the night exactly after three hours of sleep, even though I was pretty sure all of them had done it once.

I had joined in on those team training exercise, or as my teammates liked to think about it as "Let's beat the crap out of Rabbit the rookie" exercise. They were purely taijutsu and weaponry exercises since ninjutsu with six Anbu trained in heavy assault tended to get a little out of hand. Still, for the first ten days, I was the always the one who got beaten like a sack of potatoes. As days went by, my speed and reflex got better, but I was still far from their level. Although, I definitely could give them a run for their money before they could beat me down like a ragged doll. Hell, just a few days ago, I actually got a chance to dislocate Falcon's shoulder, and that deserved something.

Otter was a nice person, but that only applied when she wasn't holding her katana. She was absolutely fierce and ruthless in kenjutsu training, but still, after a few days of training, she had gotten the permission for me to use my twin swords in battle instead of the standard Anbu issued straight blade.

I stood in the shade on training ground 13, recuperating after the last assassination mission I took with Captain. Although on most of the missions Team Ro moved as a team, there were some special occasions where only a few members were asked to take a mission based on their specialties. For example, if there was an assassination mission, It was usually just me and Kakashi; if there was a tracking mission, it was usually just Otter and Falcon. The Anbu system was complicated since they got assignments directly from the Hokage. Now, the real point was, I was never allowed to go on missions alone. Someone was always there to keep an eye on me, be it Kakashi or my other teammates. I guess that it was reasonable, seeing that my brother's history didn't exactly spell out 'trustworthy'. However, given that Hokage-sama did place me here, I should damn well take full advantage of it.

Like I said, I was recuperating and Naruto decided to take a swing at me. He was aiming for my ribs, but like usual, I sidestepped and grabbed his arm, twisted it and threw him on the ground.

"Once again, Naruto-kun, stop aiming at such predictable places, and keep your shoulders down, it will hurt more when you tense up like this." I said exasperatedly as I released his arm and he jumped up from the ground effortlessly, ready for another round. Little energetic brats, I could never beat him down to the ground and make him stay there unless I kill him.

"Now, when you are grabbed by your opponents in taijutsu, the first thing you think about is not how to pull back, but rather how to hit them so they can let go." I explained to the little ball of orange as clearly as I could, but Naruto just looked at me with those confused puppy eyes.

"Okay, I am going to aim at you and I want you to grab my wrist as if you want to restrain me and then I want you to aim a punch at me." I commanded as I got into the standard taijutsu position she taught at the Academy. With a huge nod, Naruto also got into the position like an eager little tiger.

Using a rather slow speed in my opinion, I aimed at Naruto's head and his small hand raised just in time to stop my fist in the track. After successfully grabbing my wrist, Naruto threw a punch at me just like I told him to. Quickly, I turned my body to avoid that punch, and using the momentum I gained, I thrust my other elbow at Naruto's neck with a sharp motion.

My elbow stopped at an inch from his neck as he released his hand and gulped in fear. However, as soon as I retracted my arms from that dangerous position, Naruto's fear quickly turned into awe and excitement.

"Sometimes, the offense is the best defense. Want to try it again?" I asked with a smile and he nodded furiously.

Naruto was about to have another go when I heard a large explosion and smelled something burning to my right. When I turned around and saw one side of the forest burning, I cursed and immediately rushed over. While I was running, I did a hand seal and waved my hands towards the burning trees. The water from the nearby river flew up and doused the flames, then the trees were left charred with smoke.

"Sasuke, you idiot! What the hell, I told you to practice your control, not burn the forest down!" I yelled at my little brother, who refused to look at me in the eyes.

"I was just trying to see how much chakra I can use for Katon: Phoenix Sage Fire." Sasuke complained, trying to argue with me and I just glared at him.

"Okay, I got it, sorry…I won't do it again." Sasuke lowered his head in defeat.

"I told you to get the fireballs around the trees into the water, not crash them. Geez, I know that you want to try out the jutsu, but that's not how you use it. Phoenix Sage Fire is a long range jutsu for a reason." I said to Sasuke patiently, hoping that he could actually calm down and listen to me.

"Haha, teme, you are screwing this up!" Naruto laughed as he came up behind me and I could just feel Sasuke ready to do something stupid.

"Naruto-kun, you are not much better in listening to my advice, your taijutsu is basically run into the enemy and hope it hits. So like I said, relax your shoulders and actually prepare your hits so that they aim at places." I said to Naruto, who scratched his head with an awkward smile. The next few minutes went consists of a lot of shouting and screaming with lots of insults such as "teme" and "bastard", "deadlast" and "dobe". I covered my face with one of my hands and silently ask myself why did I spend my resting time on this.

Suddenly, my felt my tattoo flared up under my shirt. It's Captain regrouping the team for a mission, and it usually meant that we only have fifteen minutes to get ourselves ready.

"Hey, kids, I need to run now, got a mission. So you guys stay safe and keep on practicing." I said to the two battering children in front of me and they immediately stopped chatting. Sasuke and Naruto gave me the disappointed puppy eyes, but I continued to stare at them with a straight face.

"Oh, come on! You almost never come back, and now you are finally back after a week, you are going to leave again?" Sasuke asked with frustration, and all I could do was smile at him sadly. I knew he was bored. Sadly, after the incident with Itachi, the Hokage was not allowing anyone to graduate early anymore since people were protesting that early graduation could potentially lead to mental instability (trust me, it really had nothing to do with that). As a result, Sasuke and Naruto were pulled out of their current classes and they would join again when they turn eight.

Sasuke spent his time arguing with Naruto, practicing jutsu or staying at the Nara compound, since he hated staying at the Yamanaka compound. I had no idea why Jonin Commander Nara would let Sasuke stay at their places when both Shun and I were out; Naras liked to keep out of troublesome business by nature. It would be more likely if Jonin Commander Nara were instructed by the Hokage to keep an eye out for Sasuke, just like how he was keeping an eye on me in Anbu. It was all precaution and I wasn't dumb enough to assume they would let two Uchihas run wild after the massacre, no matter how kind the Sandaime Hokage seemed.

I couldn't be there for my little brother; in fact, I had to admit I was not making much progress in Anbu. I couldn't find any information on my brother's whereabout, or any active mission in retrieving him. It was like he didn't exist, remembered as a murderer, but forgotten quickly. The Uchihas were of the past now, buried by history. I shouldn't rush it, it had only been one month, and it's not like Anbu was a supermarket for information.

"Sorry, Sasuke, I know I say that all the time…I'll definitely be back soon, it won't be long!" I said gently as I kneeled in front of him so that my face was at the same height as his.

"...It's like you don't even want to come back…" My heart sank as I heard Sasuke's quiet mumble. It was not like one of his temper tantrums, this time, he voice was full of the kind of doubt and sadness that I wish he would never know of.

"You Idiot." I said crisply as I placed my hand on his head and rubbed his already defiant hair, making it even more disorganized, "Where else would I go when you are right here in Konoha? Why wouldn't I return when you are everything to me?" Sasuke grunted and complained in annoyance, but the doubt and uncertainty in his eyes faded just a bit.

I didn't know how to lighten up the mood, it was really not my forte whatsoever. However, for once I was glad for Naruto's loud nature. Naruto started an argument with Sasuke and just for the sake of his pride, Sasuke took that argument and ran with it.

"Why don't you try some chakra control exercise with Naruto-kun while I'm gone. From what I was seeing, I think both of you could use some exercise. I taught you how to do it once, now teach it to Naruto-kun, won't you?" Under the background of insults and yellings, I said quickly for lack of better words. Before Sasuke could say anything back, I flickered away towards the Anbu facility. I was running away and I knew it, but I was too just ashamed and useless to stay there.

I arrived at locker room 15 quickly and changed into my gear quickly. Right after I put on the rabbit mask, everyone else arrived one by one in their gears.

"Good, we are all here. Team Ro received a mission assignment from Hokage-sama." Hound announced as we stood by our locker and listened carefully. "The intelligence division received reports of a Konoha missing-nin in the Land of Tea." he pulled out a black Konoha bingo book and flipped to a certain page before he showed it to us.

"Watanabe Nobu, former Konoha Tokubetsu Jonin, defected during the Third Shinobi war along with three more Chunins. Specialty: explosives." Falcon read the pages out loud, then he voiced the question we all had in our mind "But this is a high B-rank criminal at best, and two or three of us could take care of that. Why assign the whole team?"

"The problem is, our intelligence division didn't acquire this information on their own. Instead, it was reported by the Tea Daimyo. Watanabe Nobu was reported to be planning an assassination of the Tea Daimyo and his families, in order to take over the Land of Tea, at least that's what Hokage-sama heard from the Fire Daimyo who heard it from the Tea Daimyo." Hound explained and immediately, there were sighs and groans in the room. The point of this being assigned a higher priority than it deserved was clearly because the Hokage needed to keep good relation with the Fire Daimyo. The Fire Country and the Land of Tea had a good relation with each other, and they traded each other in crops and tea very often. There was also the fact that the Land of the Tea was by the Fire Country's border, and having a Konoha missing-nin assassinate the Tea Daimyo was definitely going to damage the foreign relation.

"So I guess we are also on protection details because the Fire Daimyo needs Konoha to show that we sincerely care." Zebra summarized with a sour tone. Nobody liked guarding missions, especially when our clients are civilians who couldn't fight. For us, the killing was usually much easier than protecting, and the fact that this was a mission we couldn't fail just made our lives harder than usual.

"Good, so we are all on the same page here. Mission objective: Eliminate Watanabe Nobu and those associated with assassination; protect the Tea Daimyo and his daughter. We are expected in three days, so start packing, we leave in ten minutes." Hound ordered, there was a round of "understood" before we started to pack our supplies. I opened the locker stared at it blankly, there was really not much to pack, weapons, spare weapons, storage scroll for basic survival supplies… and that's it. I slammed the locker door a little harder than I should while I was thinking about all the time I screwed my little brother over. There was a loud sound and suddenly people in the room were staring. I shrugged my shoulder and ignored them; in turn, they ignored my little outburst.

The Land of Tea was located South of the Fire Country, in a small strip of land that branched off of the continent. They had no active Shinobi village, but rather, a normal military, who would be screwed if a bunch of Shinobi decided to take over. The Fire Daimyo couldn't let that happen no matter what, the political effect and the economical effect that was just too great, even if the new leader was not a Konoha missing-nin. The Land of Tea was probably safer to remain a sub-country beside the Fire Country, at least, in the Fire Daimyo's perspective. There was also the fact that the Fire Daimyo really liked to drink their tea (there really was a paid C-rank mission on transporting premium oolong tea from the Land of Tea for the Fire Daimyo).

Unlike the normal covert missions, we had to report to the Tea Daimyo, but that just destroyed the point of us trained in stealth and secrecy. Apparently, investigating around in a foreign castle spelled 'HOSTILE' even if we were protecting them.

We passed the border like shadows, but we ended up having to stop in front of the castle and explain our mission to the castle guards. The guard looked a bit stunned and angry, but he still led us to the Daimyo.

"Welcome, Konoha Shinobi. I am the Daimyo of the Land of the Tea and this is my daughter Fukiko." The Tea Daimyo greeted us from his throne. He was a plump looking man in his sixties, he wore his giant fancy robe along with a headpiece with the Land of Tea symbol etched on it. Beside him was a beautiful young girl dressed in delicate kimonos and flowery jewelry. The princess - Fukiko - was a different kind of beauty than what was usually perceived in Shinobi world. Her body shape was too slim than what was considered battle healthy, and her arms seemed too delicate to hold weapons. She was a Yamato Nadeshiko, but those who survive in the Shinobi world were kunoichis who fought as hard and as ruthless as men.

"It is an honour to have an audience with the Tea Daimyo-sama. We were sent by the Sandaime Hokage-sama to protect you and your family as well as to eliminate the threat of your assassination." Like always, it was Hound who spoke up and explained our missions while the rest of us kept silent.

"I am glad! I was really worried but now I see I can rest assured. Konohagakure does indeed produce lots of strong shinobis. However, the mask seems completely unnecessary in my court." The Tea Daimyo began the sentence with a lighthearted laugh, but soon, the joy in his words died down. I could almost feel my teammates scrunch their eyebrows behind the mask, it was bad enough we had to identify our mission before it was complete, so there was no way we are revealing our identities to strangers.

"My apologies, Daimyo-sama, but it is a protocol for my squad. If you will read the letter from Hokage-sama, I am sure you would understand the reason for it." the Tea Daimyo stayed silent for a few minutes as he read the letter prepared by our Hokage-sama. Finally, he put down the letter and said: "Very well, I see the reason behind it. Now, I wish to understand your plan of how to guard us and eliminate that shinobi."

"At the time being, some of us will be guarding the palace, while others will be tracking the enemy. Once we identify the enemy, we will move to neutralize all threats." Hound answered briefly with lots of ambiguous answers.

"And will some of you be enough? I see only six of you here, and you plan to use some force to search the enemy, how will our safety be guaranteed?" the Daimyo frowned.

"We are all capable shinobis here, and we will do all we can to protect you and your daughter. It would be easier to neutralize the threat as soon as possible." Hound responded in a completely professional voice but knowing him, Kakashi probably was trying really hard to be done with this.

"Fine, but I have one condition. Anyone who guards my daughter must be a female, in order to protect her honour." the Tea Daimyo said sternly. I wanted to shake my head at that moment, the only female team members here were me and Otter, but Otter was specialized in sensing and tracking, and that probably meant I would be left on guard duty to a princess.

"You shall be dismissed." the Tea Daimyo announced before we left and room and retreated to the corner of a hallway.

As soon as we were alone, Hound signaled us ' _You heard me, three of us will be on guard duty and three of us will be on tracking. Otter, Falcon, you two are with me on tracking. Zebra, Bear and Rabbit will be on protection details in the castle until we come back."_ All six of us signaled ' _Understood'_ before Hound continued.

' _Zebra you will be protecting the Daimyo, Rabbit, you are protecting his daughter. Bear, survey the castle discreetly, so we get all the possible entrances and exits for the castle. Zebra, Rabbit, identify yourselves before your clients so they don't freak out.'_ Hound pointed out, and with a heavy heart, I nodded. That was the last instruction he gave us before the three on tracking team plus Bear dispersed, leaving Zebra and me behind to guard the helpless civilians.

"Yeah, I know, we got the sucky jobs." Zebra muttered to me before he walked away towards the direction of the Daimyo. After a moment of silence, I nodded in agreement. But Captain's order was absolute unless Hokage-sama said otherwise.

It wasn't hard to find Lady Fukiko's room, considering how many servants she had. The servants escorted her to her spacious suite and closed the door behind her, but before they could close it completely, I slipped through with a body flicker. When I appeared in front of the startled teenager, I realized I completely forgot about the part where we don't freak out our clients.

"Please don't fright, Lady Fukiko, I was ordered by Hokage-sama from Konohagakure to protect Lady Fukiko of the Land of the Tea. Please continue your daily life as usual." I said quickly before the girl could scream. Thankfully, she clearly had some training in lady-like manners, because she quickly composed herself in front of me.

"I saw you before in my father's court, you must be one of them sent to eliminate the threat of assassination." She said and I nodded.

"Who are you?" She questioned with curiosity.

"You may call me Rabbit." I answered briefly.

"Are you a boy or a girl?"

"Rest assured, Lady Fukiko, I am a female shinobi." I guess I couldn't blame her for questioning. I was only twelve in this body, and with the chest binding and the armour vest I was wearing, it was hard to tell the gender except that I was a small, slim person.

"Ah, that's boring." Okay, I did not expect that response, clearly she didn't share her father's sentiment of conservatism.

"It would be nice if you seemed fun, but clearly, you are an old short hag who speaks like a machine." I couldn't tell if she was serious or not because she sounded like she was just saying what she thought without a single idea of how mean that sounded. _What a great way to stay alive, pissing off your bodyguard._

"Father could have sent a fun servant to look after me, instead, all I get are those serious looking court ladies telling me how to behave. Then there's you, for someone so small, your speech is no fun, like an old prude." I was pretty sure being professional was being no fun. A spoiled teenager, I thought, I can't believe I have to guard a spoiled teenager. Still, I held my temper and shut up. After a few seconds, she stopped paying attention to me and I started setting up traps in her room to make sure no one could approach her without me knowing.

The awkward silence lasted for a few hours, until the sunset. The girl was doing some embroidery and then looking for some clothes. She ate her lunch with her father, so I escorted her from behind. There were no assassination attempts and the teenager's actions were completely normal. That's it, it's too normal, Lady Fukiko, despite being a protected spoiled brat, was not scared of the assassination at all. Most young girls living in a protective castle would cling onto others if they had known they were being targeted, but she seemed at ease, completely unworried. Of course, I couldn't jump to any conclusion, for all I know, she could have just been feeling rebellious against her father, or maybe she felt no goal in life and therefore not afraid of death.

"Rabbit, you can leave now, I don't like people in my room when I sleep. It's creepy." Lady Fukiko said to me annoyingly.

"But Lady Fukiko, it would be best for your safety if I stay with you. I will make myself hidden so you won't be aware of my presence." I argued, it's not like I want to be with her, but it's my job.

"Just stay outside of my room, then you can rush in if anything happens. Get out! Or I will complain to my father." She said with a pout, and I mentally shook my head. I walked outside silently and propped myself against the closed door. I had traps all over the room, most of them were non-fatal, just a little chakra detecting jutsu. But I put a few stringed kunai traps by the window, so if anyone tried to enter from outside without my knowledge, they would get kunai to the head.

Suddenly, I felt a breeze of wind and then the Hound was beside me. "How was the protection details today." He asked casually while leaning on the wall.

"Other than the fact I was called an 'old hag' by someone older than me, it's great. How about you?" I whispered the sarcasm, but underneath my voice, I signed ' _no assassination attempt today, the client is suspiciously calm."_

"Not much, still investigating. Otter is back to take your shift" Hound whisper and signalled ' _found a possible base, continue the investigation tonight, the two of us and Bear will go tonight.'_ I nodded. The tracking team probably found a potential location, and Bear was definitely needed for raw fighting power, his wood release was not a joke.

Before I could respond, I felt the trap near the window activated. Immediately, I bolted for the door. While I pushed open the door, I heard the sound of kunai launching. With one body flick, I was beside the window, with a startled Fukiko beside me.

I scanned the room quickly with my eyes, there was no one but Fukiko here. Hound was standing by the door keeping the escape route confiscated and I looked out from the window. There was nothing in sight other than the guards patrolling the ground, yet the kunai trap was activated, strings were disturbed and all the kunais were launched. I counted, all eight kunais were stuck on the wall, which meant whoever disturbed the trap evaded.

"What happened?" I asked Fukiko, who stood by me with shock.

"How am I supposed to know? I just… just opened the window for some air, and then those things almost killed me!" Lady Fukiko said frantically. I eyed her from behind my mask, her breath was hitched, which was reasonable, consideration her encounter with the weapons. However, one of her hands was clenched tight by her neck and the other was hovering over her mouth. Usually when one was startled, they place their hands on their chest in an attempt to calm their heartbeats, however, Fukiko had one hand hovering her mouth, as if to hide it. For those untrained in lying, that was an instinctive sign for covering up. Also, the kunai trap could be activated if she really put her body out of the window far enough, but not the chakra signal trap, since it could only detect a chakra level developed above chunin level.

"Please calm down, Lady Fukiko, was there no intruder in your room?" I asked the angry princess.

"NO! I just wanted some air, and this happened. Did you put that trap on the window?" She yelled at me as she walked back to her bed.

"Yes, my apologies, but it was the best way to keep you safe."

"Then you should have told me." She yelled, "Leave, don't ever put something like that in my room again, you stupid old hag!" With that, she hopped back onto her bed and ignored me again. Quietly I walked out of her room, lightly closing her door behind me. Otter was also here, along with Hound, since she was supposed to take the evening watch.

"This is what I have to work with?" Otter asked me dryly and Hound turned away immediately.

"Yeah, good luck with this." I whispered lightly to my teammates before following my captain, knowing that she would most definitely set the trap no matter what our spoiled client said. _Not a lot knows my pain, but Otter certainty will. Let's just say that she won't appreciate Fukiko's pattern of speech any more than I do._

When the assault team that was composed of Hound, Bear and me moved far enough from the castle, we were finally able to debrief the plans.

"Falcon and Otter had found some shinobi tracks and that lead us to an abandoned tea factory three hour's journey from the castle. We didn't find tracks of Watanabe, but we did find a band of civilians that seemed to be either working for him or following him. There maybe missing-nin in there, possibly all from Konoha defected during the war. So our mission tonight is to assassinate all the Konoha missing-nins, but not the civilians, they are not in our jurisdiction. Once the influence of the shinobi is gone, the Tea Daimyo can take care of the rest of the gang. Bear will act as a distraction, and Rabbit and I will move silently." Hound explained the mission to us.

Bear's wood release was a powerful offensive and defensive move, it would allow him to attract all the attentions and defend themselves at the same time. Hound and I were trained in assassination specifically and would be the best choice for eliminating specific targets. If not for that, I was sure that the tracking team could just flood the factory and be done with it (pretty sure that the trip back was to get Bear, not me, but hey, with Fukiko in the castle, I'm not complaining). Weapons don't have eyes, and apparently, killing civilian citizens in a foreign land was a big 'no-no' whatsoever. This was why we don't like protection missions, you never know when a sharp object decides to bounce the wrong way.

"Captain, I suspect there is a spy in the castle, and I suspect it to be Lady Fukiko." I spoke suddenly, and both Hound and Bear turned to look at me.

"And why do you suspect so?" Hound asked.

"She was lying earlier when the trap was activated, there was no way she could have activated the chakra signal. The kunai trap maybe, not the chakra one. Someone at least Chunin level was there at the window and she covered up for he/she" I explained, knowing that Hound would understand my suspicion. He was there, he also saw what I saw.

"Very possibly, but that means she was working with those who plan to assassinate her father." Hound commented, and we all fell silent because of that disturbing thought.

"We will keep an eye on her tomorrow, but right now, we focus on the this. Once we take care of Watanabe and his gang, it wouldn't matter if she were a spy or not." Hound concluded and we moved again towards the abandoned tea factory. But it would matter, I thought, at least to her father; the feeling of being betrayed by someone very close to you could destroy a person.

The old tea factory was more like a haunted house rather than a base of operation. The walls were stained black and brown and the wooden warehouse seemed to be crumbling at any moment. It wouldn't hold a lot of soldiers, not even close to one-tenth of the military of the Land of the Tea. However, one of the tokubetsu jonin specialized in explosives was leading them, and that meant normal military power couldn't overpower them unless there was to be a large number of sacrifice. To a country as small of the land of the Tea, large sacrifices in their military power could be fatal. Besides, it was Konoha missing-nin, which meant it was our problem to deal with.

We arrived at the factory and observed the dark building behind the cover of trees. However, we found no trace of anyone moving, there were no lights, nor guards outside the factory. Finally, we saw someone walking out the locked door; it was a man, most likely to be a civilian, and he was carrying something in a box.

Hound gave the order immediately after having confirmed there were indeed suspicious persons inside. ' _Bear, start the distraction. Rabbit, find any possible targets and eliminate them'_ our captain signed.

Bear moved first, and with a skilled body flicker, he was standing in front of the tea factory. After a flash of hand seals, he slammed his palms into the ground and let dozens of wood pillars rise from the ground, slamming them into the tea factory. The moment the attack began, the Hound and I bolted, him looking to the left while I looked to the right. I was aiming for the back window, because once Bear's attack in the front started, the targets would have two choices, stay and fight or run away, and either way, the back window was the ideal place for identifying targets and assassination.

I ran around the right side first, looking for any place to escape. There was a back door and a back window about ten meters apart from each other on the right side, and it seemed like people were already running out of the door. Using my sharingan, I began to search for anyone's chakra coil who was more developed than usual, unfortunately, they all seemed to be civilians. I quickly bolted through them, tapping every one of them with a small surge of highly concentrated electricity at my fingertips, rendering them paralyzed, but still alive.

I went inside through the back door and started searching for shinobis from the chaotic scenes. To my surprise, there were no shinobi appearing on my vision. There was a chance that they were suppressing their chakra signal, but I doubt that's their priority when the attack happened. Nevertheless, I went on observing their movements.

I sighed when I couldn't find anyone with shinobi characteristics. Hopefully, Hound had already killed them. I proceeded to paralyze everyone who was not yet subdued by Bear's wood release. The whole ordeal lasted less than ten minutes, and the whole base was out.

"Found our targets?" Hound asked me when we regrouped, and I just shook my head.

"Me neither, they either have another base separated from the civilians, or they must have run away before we got here. Maybe they found our scouting trace earlier, or maybe our little princess tipped them off." Hound concluded after he checked the surrounding areas "Either way, they've gone into hiding."

"Captain, there were eighty-three civilians and dozens of crates containing explosives." Bear reported and for the first time, I looked at the crates that were stacked inside the factory with interests.

"They were raw explosives?" I asked and Bear nodded, confirming my suspicion.

"They are not running out of the country, they are still here waiting for the chance to strike." Hound said immediately, thereby confirming my suspicion. There was a pause before Hound continued with the line of reason, "Supposedly, if Lady Fukiko is in line with the missing-nins, then if they succeeds in killing the Daimyo, then Lady Fukiko will become the next ruler of the Land of the Tea, and when that happens, she is allowed to grant immunity to Watanabe and his gang, thus allowing them to live in the Land of Tea with no punishment. So it doesn't matter if their hideout was found or not, as long as Watanabe succeeds in the assassination, their freedom will be guaranteed."

"And he probably has lots of explosion seals ready on them." Bear muttered and Hound nodded.

"If they were to give the seals to Lady Fukiko, then she would have the perfect opportunity to assassinate the Daimyo. She probably doesn't have the seals now, seeing the raw explosives, they were planning to stage the death as a riot with the cover of raw explosives. But now, it may be her only way." I finished that line of thought, realizing just how dangerous Fukiko could be with her acts of innocence and her position in the court.

"We need to regroup with our teams and warn them about Fukiko, for the next few days before we find Watanabe. She must be isolated no matter what." We all nodded at our captain's command.

"What about the civilians and the explosives?" Bear asked and Captain answered "Alert the authority of the Land of the Tea and let them take care of it. We have four missing-nins to take care of." Then he asked, "Say, Bear, are there any events recently that will force Daimyo to come out of the palace?"

"There is going to be a Tea Festival in two days, and since it's an annual national festival, the Daimyo usually makes an appearance at the end to announce the winner of the 'Best Tea Contest'." Bear responded diligently. An annual festival would be a perfect place to strike since the Daimyo would not be surrounded by the Palace walls.

"What an amazing coincidence." Hound uttered sarcastically and I couldn't agree more. _Got to be careful with c_ _oincidences, they will either save you, or they will kill you._

* * *

A/N: "Art is a bang!" - Deidara... So next chapter deals with explosions, but compared to Deidara's, this guy is a small fry, so practice for later encounters?


	17. Chapter 17 - Liar Liar

A/N: Good day?! Yeah, good day!

Beta'd by the whimsical Alice J.

* * *

Chapter 17 - Liar Liar

"Hey Rabbit, have you ever been in love?" I heard Lady Fukiko asking when it was my shift to guard her the day before the Tea Festival. Technically, Otter was also here, but she was guarding on the outside while I was inside her room. Hound and Falcon were off to investigate, hoping to catch Watanabe and his gang before the festival. We didn't inform the Daimyo of his possible assassination at the festival, so we were using him as the bait and nobody objected.

"No, Lady Fukiko." I answered with a bored tone. _Can we stop this chit-chat? I haven't slept for a while, a peaceful quietness would really help right now._

"I guess you wouldn't, you are so young after all. How old are you? Ten, eleven, twelve?" Fukiko went on and ranted. I ignored her questions; under no circumstances was I obliged to answer them.

"What about likes, have you ever been infatuated with someone?" the girl continued to ask, and I felt my eyebrows twitch behind my mask. She just didn't know when to shut up, does she? For a little girl, she sure was quite a liar, chit-chatting with me while planning to assassinate her father. Either she was really good at lying, or she just didn't care. Either way, she could be a promising star in the business of assassination, if she had started the training earlier.

"No." I said, keeping my body statue-like. Fukiko flopped her body back down to the bed and proceeded to play with her hair when she realized I was not the best candidate for small talks.

"You see what I mean, you are so boring, what do you even do in spare times? Your life seems almost as boring as mine, except you get to go out of the country and you get to do exciting stuff with others." the teenage girl muttered in a tone mixed with self-pity and envy. _So she craves adventure in life and human interaction, is that why she rebelled against her father?_ I thought silently.

"Hey, tell me about your teammates, what are they like? Actually, tell me about the others, I already know that you and Otter are completely boring, a pair of old hags." I was suddenly glad that Otter was not here right now; like I said, my mentor was scary with her katana. I didn't answer the girl, I had no right to gossip about my teammates, and she could be just gathering information for Watanabe.

"Fine, keep on ignoring me like that, you are just as boring as those servants father sent me. He won't even allow me to see any men, saying that they are improper, but come on, everyone here is so boring." Somehow the little lady decided that I was the right person to complain to as if I was her listening ear for the day. It did give me a few ideas about the spy we were working with here. This girl was spoiled by her father, yet she craves exciting adventures, companionship, and even romantic love… _Oh, so this is what it's about._ _She was infatuated with one of the missing-nins, she thought she was in love._ Being as protected as she is, she was probably tricked. I doubt she was even aware of the implication of her father's assassination, as all she sees is a way to break free from her father's rules.

I felt no pity for her, instead, I hated her. _How dare she get tangled in the business of assassination when she has no way of protecting herself? That dark world was not for normal people, and if you aren't prepared for it, then you have no business in there._

The girl continued to rant on about all aspects of her lives, adventure, excitement, and love, so I ignored her the whole way. Eventually, she quieted down and decided to leave me in peace. This night, I didn't trust her at all. I stayed in the room, hiding in the dark and set up a few more traps with a lot more kunais and shurikens than before, and I didn't care if she decided to "accidentally" open the window or not.

For that night, nothing happened, it was just me, Otter and this teenage girl, as if the calm was just the prelude for the storm that was going to happen tomorrow at the Tea festival.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

The Tea Festival started with a bang, the kind that can blow you into pieces.

One hour before the explosion, we had searched all over the guards, the Daimyo's clothes and his carriage for any kind of explosive tags. But there was a reason that Watanabe Nobu was a Tokubetsu Jonin in the art of explosives because no one could have guessed he would plant invisible tags that held just as much power as those written in inks.

So that's how the day started with a bang, the kind that almost killed the Tea Daimyo, but it didn't, because Zebra was fast enough to carry the plump Daimyo off of his carriage and Bear was fast enough to set up an earth wall barrier. So, the Daimyo lived, shaking like a scared kid beside Zebra. Unfortunately, four of his guards were instantly killed off in the explosion, but fortunately, Watanabe and his gang finally showed themselves.

They weren't particularly interesting or scary looking, but looks can be deceiving since Watanabe's invisible tag was annoying as hell. His tactics consist of throwing kunais and shurikens laced with explosions, but you didn't know which one will actually explode. There was also the fact that he obviously planted preexisting invisible tags in the marketplace beforehand, and it only took one wrong step for us to blow up into pieces. The only way, for me at least to know when they will explode, was the fact that my sharingan could see the sudden surge of chakra at the explosion spot a second before they actually explode. Having a Byakugan right now would have been useful, since those eyes could see even the slightest hint of chakra signal hidden in the tags, unlike my sharingan, which could only see strong surges.

I grabbed a dazed Fukiko beside me and jumped away from an incoming kunai. Just as it exploded a second later, I landed about ten metres away from the kunai and protected the girl with my backs. The explosives had a range of about ten meters as I realized earlier, so some of my clothes were burned, but there was no major damage done. Zebra was charged with protecting the Daimyo and heal the wounded, and I was charged with protecting Lady Fukiko, who despite being a traitor, was still a target of protection in our mission.

When I looked up again, I saw a dozen of incoming kunai towards me and I silently cursed. I formed a quick hand seal and shot up a dozen water bullets from my hands. Water Release: Water Bullets was one of the first water ninjutsu Kakashi taught me, and I willed the water bullets to hit the kunais, deflecting them away towards the empty stalls instead of us. Then I summoned up an earth wall around the girl and me when the sounds of explosions rang in my ears. The Water Bullets deflected most of the kunais far enough so that my Earth wall could actually withstand the damage, seeing Earth release was really not one of my strong suits.

Just as the smoke cleared, I felt a searing pain in my left arm and my hands came loose around my client. The girl freaking stabbed me with a fallen kunai. As the red blood fell from my arm, Fukiko ran frantically, towards the center of the explosion, towards Watanabe.

The worst part of all of this was the fact that she ran blindly and before I could stop her, she stepped on one of those invisible tags and I could see the chakra surge under her feet. I ran after her using a body flicker and I grabbed the flimsy girl and rolled behind a fallen board.

The explosion broke the board and flung us away with a sharp impact. When I stood up again with the shaken girl in my arm, I yelled at her: "What do you think you are doing? Stay the hell out of this!"

"But, Nobu, he wouldn't! He promised this will be over soon…" The girl looked dazed, eyeing the broken festivals and the charred bodies of those who didn't evacuate in time.

"Well, he just tried to kill you! What do you think assassination means, it means death, like all of these bodies." I screamed at her, not sure if she was actually hearing my words.

"I need to… I need to go see Nobu, I need to tell him to stop. We could still be together, I will run away with him, he doesn't have to do this" Fukiko struggled in my arms, and it's making my job at protecting her a real pain in the ass. _Can't she see that Watanabe only wanted her for her claim as the ruler? Can't she see that her father was going to die no matter what according to Watanabe's plan?_

"Stop it, snap out of it, I'm taking you back to the palace." I snapped furiously at the girl and I proceeded to drag her with me. Of course, being the stubborn teenager she was, she just had to bite the spot on my arm where she stabbed earlier. The searing pain numbed me for a second and she tried to run away, but I clamped my other hand on her shoulder to hold her in place. Suddenly, another wave of kunais came for me, and I had to let go of her to draw my swords and defend myself.

As I parried away the kunais and dodged the explosions, Fukiko ran away like a stray dog. Surprisingly, she didn't step on any more explosions until she reached the standstill between Watanabe and my teammates. After the battle, only Watanabe remained standing like a tragic hero. Three of his companions were either dead at the Anbu's feet or were still skewered on their swords.

Suddenly, Fukiko jumped towards Watanabe and started to sob on him. Watanabe was snapped out of his tragic hero stance and stared at the girl wide eyes, "What are you doing here Fukiko? I told you to run away to the castle the moment it all started!" He scolded her. I thought he would push her away or use her as a hostage, but instead, he scolded her like a brother to sister, with concerns and anger in his eyes. What. The. Hell?

"But Nobu, you said that only my father will disappear, but this… this is not what you promised." Fukiko sobbed while latching onto his arms. I had no idea what my fellow teammates thought of this exchange, but apparently, the Tea Daimyo thought his daughter was taken as a hostage.

"Stop, don't hurt my daughter, stop the attack, not if my daughter is there!" The old man yelled from the background, inside a heavily protected circle of guards with Zebra beside him.

"This is the only way, Fukiko, can't you see how ruthless those Konoha shinobis are? They wouldn't care about the lives they sacrifices, and they would kill me with you as the sacrifice, as long as they achieve their goals!" Watanabe spatted with rage as he latched his arm around Fukiko, the kunai in his hands awfully close to Fukiko's neck. All of my teammates were visible in Watanabe's eyes, except for me. I could go for the kill, I should go for the kill, after all, I was trained in one-hit assassination techniques. Watanabe was distracted by my teammates and the girl in his arms, a slash in the neck, a stab in the brain stem, I could kill him quickly.

"But I can run away with you, and father can't stop us anymore and we could leave in peace." Fukiko was basically screaming with tears. Naive, I thought, so naive, as if she didn't even realize the kunai dangling close to her neck. I couldn't just kill Watanabe, not without risking a fatal blow to Fukiko, and that can't do, we still have a mission objective to accomplish (although that girl could probably use some wake-up calls).

I couldn't kill Watanabe, but I could, probably, get Fukiko away from the man. As soon as Fukiko was out of the vicinity, my teammates are more than capable of dealing with the missing-nin. My eyes flashed to Hound, his hands were behind him, where Watanabe couldn't see and he was making some signal. It said "act on opportunity". _He trusts me too much_ , I thought, _he trusts that I won't be killing Watanabe until Fukiko is safe_. Like I said, he puts too much faith in me. but unfortunately, he was right.

"You don't understand, Fukiko, even if we run away, we will have to run all the time. I'm tired of that, and I want to settle down with you, somewhere where we don't have to run…" Watanabe was monologuing, explaining his reasons to his precious Fukiko, but before he could finish his sentence, I launched for him.

It only took less than a second for me to reach Watanabe and Fukiko. I pulled out my tantō this time instead of the ninjatō because it is smaller, faster, and more precise. Before Watanabe could do anything, I had already stabbed the electricity charged blade into his shoulder. I twisted and severed his arm in an instant and his body froze from the paralyzing lightning chakra. I flipped my tantō and the arm that surrounds Fukiko flew up in an arching motion. Watanabe was reacting now because of the pain and the blood that sprayed from his limbless shoulder, but it didn't matter since I had already grabbed Fukiko and ran as fast as I could to get out of there.

I sent chakra to my feet so I could run faster, since if Watanabe planned to explode me, then I was screwed (and it would be Fukiko's fault). However, my worry ceased when I felt several trails of wind breeze passed me as I carried Fukiko off to her father. By the time I cleaned the blood from my eyes and looked back, the four Anbu was already restraining Watanabe. Hound raised his blood-stained blade above Watanabe's head, ready to deal the final blow.

"Nooo! Please, don't kill him!" Fukiko wailed in my arms despite the splatter of blood across half her body. There was no way Hound was going to stop because of the girl's scream, so I quickly ran a jolt of electricity down Fukiko's neck. Her screaming stopped and she went limp in my arm. It was easier that way, the girl was so much more troublesome when she was awake.

"Konoha! You are all ruthless, you sent me and my team to our deaths as sacrifices for the war, and yet you claim to be caring for all lives. Don't fuck with me, in Konoha's eyes, we are all disposable tools, and you are all murderers!" That was all he managed to scream out before Hound cut off his head. Suddenly the world became quiet, there were no more explosions, no more screaming, and no more wailing. Was Watanabe saying the truth or the lie? probably true, maybe Konoha did send their troops as a sacrifice for the bigger picture. It was one of the beautiful things about dying slowly: you could vent out all your anger all the while knowing it wouldn't change anything. But it was all disappearing now, our mission was finished, and the Tea Daimyo could clean up the mess his own daughter made. We lived in a cruel world, after all, a place where it's to kill or be killed.

"Fukiko, are you okay? What's going on with my daughter?" the Tea Daimyo ran towards his unconscious daughter with the help of his guards.

"Rest assured, Daimyo-sama, Lady Fukiko just fainted from the 'shock'. She should be waking up soon with no permanent damage." I told the Daimyo and let the father hug his daughter. The Daimyo hugged his daughter tight as whispered her name lightly. If he realized his daughter's betrayal, he didn't show it.

Eventually, the Daimyo issued the order for the clean up, as well as the order to take Lady Fukiko back to the care in the castle. We waited at the scene quietly as Zebra did his best to heal those scattered around.

"The Land of the Tea thank Konoha and the Fire Country for their assistance. This is the proof of the completion of mission as well as the payment, please gave Hokage-dono my thanks." the Tea Daimyo said in his usual voice with authority as he ordered his guards to gave us the scrolls.

"If you will, keep quiet about what happened with my daughter." So he did realize his daughter's grand betrayal. Obviously, for someone who values honour and conservatism so much, Fukiko's action would be a shame to the whole land.

"It would not be our decision, Daimyo-sama, it is Hokage-sama who will decide once he read our mission report." Hound answered coolly. We were Anbu, and we were loyal to no one but the Hokage. _Except I am trying to dig up information in Anbu._

"I see, your loyalty is commendable. Do you need escorts to the border?" the Daimyo spoke in a cold voice, the undertone of his words hinting that we were asked to leave and never come back again. Hound shook his head immediately and thanked his offer. Team Ro left before we extended our expired welcomes. As for what would happen to Fukiko once she wakes up, or if Watanabe really loved her, I stopped thinking about it.

When we finally entered the Fire Country border, it was already in the middle of the night. We usually don't stop for the journey at night, but this time, all of us were beat from the battle earlier, especially Zebra who spent a lot of chakras healing the injured. Captain probably thought it would be better if we stopped for the night and recuperate.

"Rabbit, next time, keep your target in sight. It was because of her that things got out of hand in the end." Hound said to me coldly as we sat in the middle of a bunch of traps. _Yeah, I did mess up with Fukiko, didn't I?_

"Yes, Captain, I'm sorry for the trouble. I will accept the punishment." I answered as I dipped my head in shame.

"You are forgiven because you are new and you still have lots to learn. Next time, when your charge is not listening, knock them out and drag them away. Otherwise, they will be a hindrance and place themselves in more danger than if they were out cold." His voice softened a little, but some coldness remained.

"Yes, Captain, I understand." I kept my head down.

"Good, now let Zebra treat your left arm. Don't hide it from me, I know it's been bleeding for a while now." my Captain scolded me and I raised my arm in front of Zebra in embarrassment.

"Damn, what happened to you, there's a kunai stab wound and… is that a bite?" Zebra asked with disbelief when he examined my blood soaked arm. It wasn't a big injury, it's just that the stab was quite deep and the blood kept flowing.

"Yeah, the girl was quite ferocious to get to her lover, so she stabbed me and then she bit me." I said it as a joke and a few of my teammates laughed. Zebra glared at them, how he did it with the mask was still a mystery, but they immediately shut up. If there was one person you really don't want to piss off, it's Zebra, since he would be the one healing you when a mission went wrong.

"Young Rabbit, were you planning on hiding the injury until your arm rots? Next time, you let me treat the wound no matter how small you think it is, or are you the medic here?" Zebra said in an amazingly calm voice as he healed my wounds, but I could almost feel the cold aura rolling off of his hands.

"No, sir, I mean, Zebra. It won't happen again." I said immediately.

"Yeah, that girl was crazy alright, all of you men are lucky that you didn't have to guard her." Otter announced our misfortune and I couldn't agree more.

"You are just hung up because she kept on calling you 'old hag', which could have been true anyway." Just like that Falcon started a never ending argument. I was on Otter's side this time. Anyone would get hung up after being called names like that. I didn't think that anyone of us was the forgiving kind.

"Quiet, people, you guys are going to get killed because you are too loud. Learn to be more like Bear, he is the only one I can stand right now." Hound said with annoyance, and was it my imagination, or did Bear's aura beam at Captain's praise.

"Yes, Captain." the rest of the crowd answered simultaneously. Eventually, we were back to being alert and silent in the darkness, just like we were supposed to.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

Time Skip - seven months

Third Person POV

From the moment Kakashi met an Uchiha, he decided that they were born to cause trouble. It was not that Kakashi thought every Uchiha is evil. No, it was just a plain observation he made, since he had yet to personally meet an Uchiha who is trouble free.

Kakashi watched as his ex-pupil - well, he guess that she could still count as one now - stabbed a giant hole through the rock with her Chidori-infused ninjatō. It wasn't her usual electricity coating on the swords, no, it was definitely Chidori. The sound of chirping birds, the highly concentrate lightning chakra and the icy blue colour, there was no mistake, it was the Chidori he developed, the dangerous ninjutsu for assassination, but she evolved it into something more dangerous. She was able to channel the Chidori through her blade and keep the highly concentrated lightning a certain distance away from her without exploding. The large hole in the rock was a best proof of how dangerous the Chidori blade was, and now imagine it combined with duel-wielding kenjutsu.

He really shouldn't be surprised, to be perfectly honest. She mastered his Chidori in a month once he had actually started to teach her wholeheartedly when she joined Anbu. She achieved the Chidori Blade variation two months ago and had moved on to create other variations, and she was only practicing Chidori Blade to perfect it. She had to perfect it, or Kakashi would never allow her to use it in battle, no matter how much she pleaded. She thought it was because of her incident with the human-puppeteer, and partially, it was.

He totally thought that puppeteer deserved it. He knew she didn't do it intentionally, she had heard of Chidori, but that was only descriptions. He had never shown it to her personally, there was no way she could have picked it up from him. It was not a gentle ninjutsu, the first time he used it in a rush, well, he lost an eye. That was the main reason why he decided to teach it her even if he didn't know her well, so that the next time she found herself in a pinch, she could use it without electrocuting her arm off. The other reason, he supposed, was because of his guilt.

He had always known her to be a genius. From the first time he saw her fight in the Chunin exam, he knew, she was a prodigy just like her brother. However, it felt different when he had actually started teaching her. He accepted the teaching request because it was a favor from his senpai, and mostly because he still felt guilty for getting her teammate killed. He never expected her to be excelling when she was only taught once per week for thirty minutes. The moment he demonstrated a jutsu in front of her, he could almost see the wheels in her head turning, taking in all the information, all the pros and cons. He thought he wasn't surprised by her abilities any more, but when she joined Anbu despite all her hatred, he was surprised once again.

She was a natural born killer. He wasn't surprised when he found out her specialty would be assassination, but he was surprised when he found out how much she excelled at it. There really wasn't much he could teach her on that topic, maybe except how to infuse ninjutsu into her strikes instead of relying on her blades and body alone. He would have said that she still lacked experience, but she seemed to have that as well despite her young age. She was absolutely ruthless when killing her target, and usually, only in one strike. It was a bit unnerving, but once again, he thought about when he had noticed it the first time they met when she had killed that Kiri-nin. It was as if she was born for Anbu.

"Finally perfected the Chidori Blade now?" he asked the girl lazily as he watched her dispel the chakra and retracted her blade.

"I perfected it a week ago, you just refuse to see it." She stated blandly and he just ignored her. She probably did, but Kakashi couldn't let her use it unless he was absolutely certain she had full control of it.

"How was your attempt at incorporating Chidori with your Raiton: Rairyu no Mai?" He asked again, changing the topic. Maiko's expression turned sour for a bit before she spoke up, "well, it's going, still have trouble with control, though. It was hard to maintain control over the highly concentrated lightning chakra when it left my palms. I can maintain two Chidori-infused dragons for a few second before they blow up because of the instability."

Her self-invented jutsu was powerful, he had no doubt about it. It's ranged, remote controlled and it was fast. But the problem was, Chidori was neither ranged nor controlled. He was skeptical, but he was glad that she had made progress. For the most of the time, he kept silent and read his favorite novel series. No matter what other people says, the "Icha Icha" series was gold. He might be a genius shinobi, but he was not a good teacher, he had admitted that a long time ago.

"So what are we learning next, you said I need to work on my other nature releases." Maiko asked as she saw his book. She didn't scream for him to put it away, instead, she glared at him briefly before ignoring the books. That was another thing why Kakashi didn't mind teaching her so much, she never complained about his novel of choice. She might not approve of it, but she didn't nag him about it.

"Yes, I did say that, didn't I? While your fire and lightning releases are proficient, your earth releases are as weak as dirt. Your water release is coming along, but you lack wind releases." He knew he was pushing her, most jonin were only required to be proficient at two chakra natures. But with her potential, it would be a waste of sharingan if she didn't learn all she could in ninjutsu. "Take a rest for five minutes, then we will work on the strength of your earth release."

His pupil sat down by the rock and proceeded to clean and sharpen her blades. Kakashi couldn't remember what she told him about her swords. He could vaguely recall that the girl told him it was a gift from her mother. _The mother she lost._

You see, the Uchiha Clan and Kakashi didn't really get along that well after the incident with his left eye, so Kakashi wasn't really paying attention to the Uchiha prodigies before, both of them. But it wasn't hard to understand the tender touch the girl placed on her swords as if it was the last remaining pieces of her broken life. Really, the Uchihas tried to put on that emotionless facade they called pride, but their eyes always gave away their deepest emotions.

"Say, Captain, are you ever going to tell me that Itachi was on your team." Kakashi's body stiffed for a second when he heard the quiet voice asking.

"No. How did you find out?" He said honestly. Just like Maiko said before, the mystery thing didn't do well between them.

"It wasn't hard, I imagine it was the same reason why I was placed on your team. Also, the other team members looked at me… differently when they saw my sharingan." Maiko answered quietly. Right, this was why he was always unnervingly annoyed by her, she was too perceptive.

"Your brother was on my team, then he got promoted to a Captain himself." Kakashi muttered.

"What was he like?" After a moment of silence, the girl asked hesitantly. Like so many other times, Kakashi didn't know how to answer that.

"He is your brother, you should know him better than I do." Immediately after he said it, he regretted it. Even if he was trying to avoid the topic, that was just too harsh of a reminder.

"I meant in Anbu. How did he adjust to Anbu?" No matter how hard she tried to hide it, there was always that tint of frustration and anger in her voice. Who was it directed towards? Itachi? Him? Or just life in general? Considering the circumstances, it was probably a bit of all three.

"He adjusted fine. He never had any problems as far as I could tell." Kakashi was speaking the truth, however, it was more like a partial truth. He wasn't particularly attentive towards the older Uchiha prodigy, especially when he was trying hard to get rid of all the connection with that clan. He supposed that he never assessed Uchiha Itachi to his full potential, and he finally took notice of him, he was already passing the bar for Anbu Captain with flying colour. When he finally remembered him, he committed a massacre and ran away.

"Really?" Maiko asked with skepticism, her eyes narrowed as if she was trying to piece together something far larger than he could comprehend.

"I don't know." Kakashi answered briefly because he honestly didn't know. However, he could understand her need for the 'why'. The 'what' was easy because everyone could see it with their own eyes, but the 'why', that was the hard part. He could understand her need for answers, her need for confirmations, or maybe even contradictions, that was why even if he shouldn't be talking about the S-rank traitor of Konoha, he still did, as long as she kept it within a reasonable boundary.

"Which team was he promoted to?" _Now that's not within a reasonable boundary._

"You are pushing it. You know I can't answer that." There was a silence. Despite the fact he never lifted his eyes from the book, he didn't understand a single word on that page.

"Then what about the way they looked at me. It wasn't the rage towards a traitor or pity I felt rolling off of other people's face, there was something else, or something... Please don't tell me they feel bad because they heard all of my family except for one was killed, everybody heard that." As always, her instinct is exceptional.

Kakashi was contemplating how much he could tell her. It wasn't about the security clearance or anything like that, it was purely about her, how would she react? It was a hard question. Maiko was unpredictable, to him, she was always more than what she seemed. He still couldn't understand her current relationship with her genius-turned-traitor brother. _Does she hate him? Does she want to kill him? Does she want to save him?_

Kakashi had no ways of knowing that answer, nor did he have anyways of predicting her behaviour. You see, despite his limited contact with the Uchiha Clan, even he would see that Maiko was an anomaly. Like Obito, Shisui, and to some extent, Itachi. She was in an entirely different category than the trend her clan seemed to follow, but she didn't seem similar to any of the other anomalies Kakashi had seen.

It was this unpredictability that made Kakashi felt a sense of danger. Sure, he could surveil her every move to make sure she didn't do something stupid. However, he couldn't figure out, at least not yet, what she would do next. And that made him feel so useless in taking any precautionary strategies.

"We were tasked with retrieving any survivors from the Uchiha Massacre, and the disposal of bodies. We found you two dying in the main house that night, and we saw the results of the massacre first hand." He said after much thinking. It wasn't a lie, it just wasn't the whole truth. There was no way he could tell her about the real objective of that mission which was personally led by the Sandaime Hokage. There was just no way. If possible, he wished she'd never find out. The mystery thing didn't work well between them because both of them saw things deeper than the appearance. So he responded with the best disguise possible, lacing the lie with the truth, and hoping this time, that her instinct might be less perceptive.

In the end, it was a summon from Hokage-sama that saved him. He felt his shoulder flare up a bright red with a searing sensation, unlike the ones he uses to summon his team, which only cause the tattoo to flare a dark red. He looked at Maiko, who obviously felt the summon as well since she was staring at her sleeve where the bright red tattoo would have been.

"Come on, Hokage-sama is summoning our team, we don't want to keep him waiting." With that, he ran, as far away from his newest subordinate as possible so he wouldn't have to face her perceptive eyes. Even though he knew that behind him, the thirteen-year-old girl would be following him closely, assessing everything with those haunting eyes. After all, he was stuck. He was stuck with her the moment the Hokage decided to place her on his team, to place her under his care, as if dealing with Uchihas was his specialty.

It really wasn't.

Considering his track record with Uchihas, one Uchiha was killed _because_ of him, and the other, committed the ultimate act of treachery while he _couldn't even_ lift a finger to stop it. If he didn't have enormous respect for the Sandaime Hokage, he would have thought it was a cruel act of sick humour to give him a third one, just to see how horribly he would fail this time.

Complicated businesses, those Uchihas and their sharingans.

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A/N: Okay, so I think this fanfic is more or less arranged kind of like a TV show, where every arc is like a season. So at the beginning, it's more episodic in nature but still following a major point. As each arc comes to an end, things will probably be less episodic and more linked together.

Thanks for reading, please review if you feel like it! Next update in a week, on next Saturday.


	18. Chapter 18 - All the World's a Stage

A/N: I received some really awesome comments from the previous chapter, but to some, I can't reply through PM but thank you all who reviewed, I am thrilled by all your comments!

I am indeed not a native English speaker, as Mandarin is my mother tongue and English is my second language. There are times when I can't catch some mistakes, probably because I've never even realized that some sentences sound awkward or that I am using some words wrong. But hey, one of my goals for writing a fic is to help me improve my grammar and English in general! So if you see any huge grammar mistakes or writing habits that irk you, I am probably still oblivious to them. And if some readers would be kind enough to point some mistakes out, that would be amazing!

Beta'd by the adorable Alice J.

* * *

Chapter 18 - All the World's a Stage

"Your mission is to assassinate Nishikawa Ryobe, a politician in Kusagakure. He is the leader of a rebellion faction that works against the current Kusagakure regime, and the leader in Kusagakure right now wants him dead." I listened quietly as Hokage-sama listed out the requirements for this mission. This time, only Hound and I were being called, seeing this was an assassination mission and the saying 'the more the merrier' wouldn't work here.

"Kusagakure has always been allies of Konoha, however, Nishikawa planned to sever all ties with Konoha if he was promoted as a leader and that is damaging to Konoha's safety, considering the Land of Grass was the only area separating our country with the Earth Country and Iwagakure," Hokage-sama explained, and it's all clear to me that this assassination was political. Kusagakure was the last barrier of war between Konoha and Iwa, the current leader must use this as a leverage against Fire Country so that Kusagakure will continue to support Konoha instead of Iwa.

"Leave as little trace as possible, and you won't be receiving help from Kusagakure so you are on your own. Here is the file on Nishikawa Ryobe, I expect results within a week." the Hokage handed the file to Hound and dismissed us. I followed my captain silently as we returned to locker room 15. The locker room was empty today since none of our other teammates were present so we took off of our masks.

I stayed still as Kakashi read file quickly, there was a reason he was a Captain, he could devise a good plan within seconds of hearing the information, and if we wanted the assassination to work, we needed a damn good plan.

"Our target here is quite a charity worker, apparently he takes in war orphans on occasions and gives them jobs," Kakashi muttered slowly. I guess whether this Nishikawa person was a good leader or an evil one really didn't matter, for the sake of Konoha, he needs to die.

"So what do we do, infiltration first or straight up assassination?" I asked.

"Infiltration first. He is a jonin level shinobi, and his followers were full of low-level jonins and high-level chunins. We can't just walk up and kill them." Kakashi concluded as he closed the files. For a moment, he stared at me, as if to decide how much I could sell.

"No, no, no. What are you planning!" I said with a sinking heart, he was planning something, and that something wouldn't be pleasant for me.

"Your hair colour is normal, and your eye colour is normal, well minus the sharingan. You looked small like a starved child. Rabbit, you are going to be pretending as a war orphan, and hope that Nishikawa will take pity to you and give you a job." Kakashi laid out the plans before I could protest.

"There was no way he is going to fall for that. He is a political leader, he must be paranoid as hell. How can you guarantee that he won't just kill me on sight." I demanded, with unease in my voice. What my captain was proposing was a risky move, one that could get me killed.

"Apparently he does. But he won't be careless, he will search you to be sure you are weaponless and he will put you somewhere very far with lots of guards beside him. Besides, people are always less suspicious of children, and you look like you could be eleven." Kakashi reassured me, but it didn't sound reassuring at all.

"Give me all your weapons, you can't have them. Remember to suppress your chakra to civilian level. And that means you can't use transformation techniques to cloak yourself. Here, use this to cover your battle scars and tattoo, just in case. Change into civilian clothes afterward" He pulled out a box from a locker and threw it to me, it was make-up. I couldn't argue with my team leader, and despite how much I hated it, it seemed feasible. A lot of danger, but feasible.

"Listen to the plan carefully," I heard Kakashi said as I start dumping out all my weapons, I got rid of my gray Anbu jacket along with my twin swords and then I proceeded to pull out all my weapons hidden on my body. The two weapon pouches, the few mini-blades hidden in my shoes, and a few more blades bound to my waist. Kakashi waited until all metal sounds were subdued before continuing.

"We will try to find him in Kusagakure roadsides, since he has a tendency to patrol the area himself, promoting his political party and charity works. You will infiltrate his camp and assassinate him. I will follow you quietly and get you out if something happens." How could he say that so easily? Forcefully, I push down the unease caused by my weaponless state and glared at him.

"Don't give me that look, you know how to kill people without any weapons, so do it. I will be there to help you. Quit glaring and let's get going." Kakashi scolded me. After another second of glaring, I grudgingly went into the bathroom.

I pulled up my shirt to reveal the stab wound on my stomach. It was a huge scar that looked like a hole in my stomach, caused by a puncture wound straight through my abdominal region. I started to cover the tell-tale sign of my battle training with the make-ups, no civilian child can get that scar and survive it.

"Put some dirt on as well when we arrived in Kusagakure, you are supposed to be a war orphan," Kakashi warned as I finished covering up the long laceration scar on my thigh and the Anbu tattoo on my shoulder.

"What am I suppose to do, crying on the roadside?" I yelled out sarcastically as I changed into the ripped linen clothes he threw at me. We had those spare clothes for infiltration laying in the locker room somewhere, but it seemed only Kakashi and Bear could find them.

"Figure that out yourself, but make it convincing, it's for your convenience after all." He was saying it so nonchalantly that I wanted to kick him. He said it so easily as if lying was that simple. _Aren't you being a little hypocritical? You lie like chewing candies,_ I thought to myself with a bitter smile. It wasn't long before I pushed open the bathroom door looking like the image straight out of the slum. _Might as well get it over with, it's not like I've never done this before._

"I'm ready, Let's go."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I hid in the bush along with Hound and watched the caravan containing our target approaching our location. It wasn't huge, but it was big enough that I can't just go and charge in. The gears in my brain turning, I had to figure out an identity, a convincing one.

A moment later, I picked up a jagged stone and used it to scratch my skins until there were faint red lines showing on my arms and legs.

"What are you doing?" Hound asked as he stared me in shock.

"Pretending. No war orphan can ran this far from their village and not have and scratches." I said coldly as I finished the disguise with a red line by my neck. Hound stared at me in silence, which was basically a way of showing that he didn't approve.

"Are you really alright doing this?" Finally, he asked and I almost laughed at his words.

"Now you are worried? You came up with the plan." I retorted sarcastically, "Just take care of my swords. I will be fine, even if things does go a little crazy, I have my Mangekyou Sharingan, remember?"

"How are you going to approach him, I hope you have a damn good plan." He let the argument dropped and changed the topic. Typical.

"Oh, you'll see, I'm going to rob him." Before he questioned me any further, I ran out of the bush and aimed straight for the caravan.

I ran like a thirteen-year-old child, not an Anbu agent. My feet were heavy and I panted as I ran. I wasn't running very fast, but I was running fast enough that people would call me a sneaky little brat. My chakra system was concealed, so to a sensor, it would feel just like civilians'. I ran towards the road, where the caravan was traveling. Right now, Nishikawa's guards hadn't noticed me yet, but soon, they will definitely notice me.

I saw a servant lady holding a plate of rice cakes, walking toward the main caravan in the center. Nishikawa obviously knew how to enjoy his authority, even if on the road. I ran towards her, and like an idiot, I jumped on her, grabbed the rice cake like a hungry little wolf and started to run back.

"Oi! Stop! Sneaky little thief!" One of the guards yelled as he ran after me. He was running faster than me, and soon he caught me. He pulled me back by my collar as I screamed and kicked, trying to get away from him using only as much strength as a hungry thirteen-year-old child would. He quickly brought me back to the caravan and dumped me on the floor. When I looked up again, I saw a man with gentle and kind eyes. Nishikawa, he was as charismatic as they say. Immediately, I flinched under his eyes like an injured little puppy and hugged the rice cake close to my chest, as if to protect my hard earned food.

"Master, I brought the little thief back, what do you want to do with him." the guard reported to Nishikawa diligently as he nudged my body with his sheathed sword.

"Child, why do you steal?" True to Hound's information, he did have a soft spot for children. I hesitated and didn't answer him, but then the guard yelled at me angrily "Oi, brat, answer Nishikawa-sama!" he brought up his sword to intimidate me and I pretended to shake in fear and whimpered.

"Stop it, Koma, you are scaring this child. It's okay, child, tell me, why do you steal, what happened to your family." He asked again gently. I looked up slowly and hesitantly, with a guarded and hurt expression in my eyes.

"I'm… I'm hungry. I haven't eaten in two days. I'm sorry, I just want to eat something." I said in a broken voice and adding the whimpers for extra effects. The man suddenly stepped out of his caravan, and I crawled back and shrunk myself. It wasn't all an act, I didn't expect that he will approach me, a suspicious figure on the street. _Or, he is planning to kill me_ , with that thought in mind, my body tensed under my loose clothes.

"Don't be afraid, my child. You can eat that rice cake you know, all you have to do is ask, not steal." He petted me. Yes, he patted my ruffled and dirtied hair with gentle strokes. It annoyed me to no ends and I almost wish I could just kill him right here. But then, I wouldn't able to escape unscathed, not with the shinobi guards surrounding the area.

"Where are your parents?" He asked again as he brought me up to the ground and ordered his servants to bring me another plate of clean rice cakes since he saw the one I was holding was covered in dirt.

"I don't know, I live in a village that way" I pointed at a general direction with my shaky hand, "But something really bad happened and our house was burned. Papa said he will come and get me soon, so he told me to run away first." I said fearfully. I - or Kakashi - did my research, there was a village destroyed three days ago in the direction I was pointing due to bandit attacks. Suddenly Nishikawa was looking at me with pitiful eyes, and a few guards around me gave out sighs. _Good, they are feeling sympathy for me._

"Oh you poor child, you don't have a place to go. Why don't you follow me? I will give you a place to stay and food to eat." He said with a sad smile, but there was something flashing in his eyes, suspicion and testing.

"No, Father said never trust strangers and he will come and get me. He promised." I said quickly, with panic in my eyes. I shouldn't accept his offer so quickly, that's way too easy.

"But I have rice cakes, and you would never have to steal again," he said gently. I was pretty sure in my old world, baiting children with food was illegal, but apparently here, it was an act of charity and goodwill.

Then, my stomach grumbled. I did _not_ plan for that, but I guess I have Kakashi to thank for that since he refused food for me for the past two days. I catch the opportunity and eyed the plate of rice cake next to the man with a longing expression and I swallowed my saliva.

Nishikawa was smiling as he ordered his servant to hand me the rice cakes. Without any hesitation, I bit them down like a hungry wolf. I was suspicious of poison, but I didn't have a choice, I need to eat like a child, a poor child who was not vigilant enough to be a shinobi.

"Come with me for now child, if your father comes for you, then you are free to leave." Hesitantly, I nodded. He asked the servant to bring me to the back of the caravan and I followed like a little rat, keeping my eyes down and my hands fidgety. I stayed quietly in one of the back caravans as a maid accompanied me. She was a shinobi, I knew that. Her feet were too light and her balance was too good when the caravan was shaking from the uneven grounds. Like Kakashi said, Nishikawa was no fool, he kept me guarded and far from him. If I wanted to kill him, then I'd have to do more than pretending to be a child.

I returned with Nishikawa to his villa, or really, his base of operation. His villa was not lavish like the Daimyo, but it was a lot more than what most can afford. The report described him as being a good shinobi from Kusagakure, good enough to be a Jonin. Then he retired when he was forty-three and became a businessman when the Third Shinobi War was over. It seemed that he was the one that brought back the economy in Kusagakure and he used some of that money to help the poor and adopt orphan children until this day. He was the kind of man that everyone would like, a powerful shinobi, a smart entrepreneur, and a kind hearted person. But when I saw the expensive villa compared to the poor conditions of most people lived in Grass, even if he had started the businesses, with the way Grass was hindered by the war, his wealth couldn't have been that great. I wondered where his wealth really came from…

Nishikawa ordered the kunoichi to take me to the bath and treat my injuries, which I had no doubt was a form of inspection and tests. The make-up would have undoubtedly been washed off if I ever touch water, a bad plan on Kakashi's part. My assassination had to start somewhere and now is as good as ever.

The woman brought me to the bath and removed my garments for me, she winced a bit when she saw all the bruises and cuts on my body. Just then I started to shake, like a rabbit being exposed to headlights.

The women immediately squatted beside me and looked at me at an eye level, she asked "What's the matter?" while looking into my eyes reassuringly.

"What's master like? Will he really take care of me?" I asked with a childish voice which I was sure Kakashi would joke for eternity about it.

The woman's posture relaxed and she answered: "Don't worry, my child, Master is the kindest person you will ever meet." She smiled into my eyes as her body relaxed. Big mistake.

My Sharingan flared, six black tomoes spinning on two red iris. Before she could even realize what the hell happened, her pupil dilated for a moment before they returned to normal. For now, she was under a sharingan genjutsu and she was mine to control. While I was at it, I scanned around and noticing no other chakra presence around.

"Are you a kunoichi?" I asked immediately, just to be sure the genjutsu was working

"Yes," she answered dazedly.

"Is there a sensor in here, can he/she sense us," I asked my most concerned question.

"Yes, one by Master Nishikawa's room, his range is 100 meters. The bath is at the opposite corner of the villa as Master Nishikawa's room, so he couldn't sense us here." I tightened my lip at the mention of a sensor. I had hoped they won't exist here since good sensors were quite rare, but I guess I was lucky that there was only one.

"Let's go into the bath, shall we, Nee-chan," I said to the Kunoichi sweetly and she smiled mechanically as if nothing happened. I could hold on to the genjutsu on one person for a few hours, and then it would break. Compared to my genjutsu skill a year ago, it was a huge improvement. _But not enough, not enough to counter Itachi._

I stepped into the bath, feeling the warm water touching my body. I sniffed the water, smelling the sweet aroma coming off from the water. Sleeping drug, I realized, so slight that any normal child would have faint after bathing here, but not enough for a trained shinobi like me or the kunoichi under my genjutsu. Now I am really suspicious, just what do they do to the war orphans they 'kindly' took in.

"So, want to talk about the security and the layout of the villa?" I whispered to the woman next to me as I washed off the makeup and the dirt on me. She told me everything, well, everything she knew. Her mind wasn't that strong against the genjutsu, especially sharingan genjutsu, maybe that's why her rank wasn't that high and her information was limited.

I bandaged my tattoo and scars and made the kunoichi believe that she bandaged it for me because it was injured. When I walked out of the bath smiling, I dispelled her genjutsu. She would believe that nothing abnormal happened, and she was comforting me with 'small talk'. She would forget my red sharingan and my face would fade out of existence in her memory eventually.

I counted the numbers in my mind as the kunoichi led me out of the bath. _Three, two, one…_ then I collapsed like a weightless doll right into the kunoichi's arm. I relaxed my muscle and adjusted my breathing to the minimum as I stayed limp in her arms.

"Finally, the paralysis is finally taking effect, just when I got bored of the little brat." The woman dropped her nice act and said with disdain in her voice. She dragged me across a few hallways and then she stopped somewhere.

"Here, Master wants her in the batch to be shipped tomorrow," she said it to someone else which I couldn't see. There was an annoying snort and then another voice answered: "Sure, dump the brat in." There was a creaking sound like a door had just been opened.

The woman threw me in mercilessly and I ignored the pain of the harsh impact. There was a collective gasp around me when the new voice spoke up: "Listen up brats, don't cause any trouble for me, or I'll kill you all!" There was a bang, and the door was shut close.

After a few second, I opened my eyes and sat up quietly. Finally, I was able to take in all the details of the room. It was a small space, about twenty meters squared. However, there seemed to be about fifty children crowded in the room, all looking sad and desperate. Human trafficking, where else would Nishikawa put all the war orphans he had 'rescued'. I thought about giving Nishikawa a swift a painless death before, but I just changed my mind.

I could hear the woman walking far far away, leaving just one guard keeping an eye on the small prisoners. Immediately, without any second thoughts, I walked up to the closed door and start kicking and banging it while yelling "Let me out! Let me out! Your bastard!"

"Stop, what are you doing, he will kill us!" A small muffled voice warned me hastily as I kept on banging the door. Eventually, there was a howl outside as the door creaked open, revealing a furious male guard.

"What the hell did you say? I'm going to…" he didn't get to finish his sentence because I leaped on to him and locked my arms onto his neck. With one forceful twist, his neck was broken and twisted at an unnatural angle. I lowered my body and stopped his fall from making a loud sound on the ground. Geez, he was heavy. But my training in Anbu did help with my strength, courtesy of Captain. Silently, I twisted his neck back to the front and propped his body up against the wall. I tucked his hands into his pockets, stealing his pouch of kunai and shurikens in the process. He looked just like he was leaning on the wall and relaxing and the whole process took less than ten seconds.

There were gasping sounds behind me from the children. _Troublesome_ , I thought, and before any of them could scream, I turned around and released the killing intent. The killing intent was not chakra based, so right now, even to a sensor, I would be a normal child. But my killing intent was malicious and ruthless enough that the children froze and fainted.

To my shock, a child was still standing before I walked away. I widened my eyes in surprise as I watch the child holding on with that trembling leg, but nevertheless, he withstood the pressure. It was a boy of age eleven or something, he had ruffled black hair and a skinny body, probably due to the lack of nutrition. _He kind of looks like an older, but food deprived Sasuke_ , I thought in my head. He looked like he was about to say something, so quickly, I turned around and appeared right next to the voice, holding a kunai against the trembling skin.

"Say one word and you are dead," I whispered coldly. He choked the sounds back into his throat and stood still like a statue as if every move would kill him. However, I could still read his lips making the shape for the words he was about to speak.

 _Save us_.

 _No no no. This is not a time for the empathy to flood out like a tsunami._ I was not a saint, but after all that had happened in this lifetime, I couldn't say that I was without emotion either. _Oh, this is so troublesome. Well, there goes my option for silent escape._

I did the only thing I could do at the moment. I stared at him, my blood red eyes to his startled black ones. Then, I put him under a genjutsu.

I had to be careful since his chakra system was very undeveloped like a new Academy students. The genjutsu was not to compel him to do something, rather it was showing him a virtual route towards one of the exits at the back of the bathhouse. There were three exits in the villa, all guarded under normal circumstances. However, the one at the back of the bathhouse was the least guarded one, according to the kunoichi, because it was the farthest from Nishikawa's study.

The genjutsu was all I could do, showing him a vague escape route and hoping he was calm enough to remember it all. I couldn't save them. I was but one assassin and I had no power to get all of them out. It was not my mission objective nor was that within my capability. However, I supposed that I could make some chaos to attract the shinobis' attentions and give them a chance to escape on their own. After all, no one would care about some children for human trafficking when their leader was assassinated. They were shinobis, trained warriors, their hearts would always be wired towards the enemy.

"When the villa becomes chaotic, hurry and wake up all the children and run," I said to the boy coldly as I withdrew the kunai. I released another wave of killing intent onto the boy and he slumped to the ground, shaking in fear. He was a child, after all, no matter how hard he resisted, he would still break easily.

"Don't go to Iwagakure, you won't survive there, not if you are from Grass." That was my last warning, he will be paralyzed for a while and then the effect of my killing intent would fade. Plenty of time for me to kill Nishikawa.

"Stay safe, and may you be able to run away when you wake up. Your fate is up to you now." I whispered softly as I left the room of unfortunate children, knowing that they wouldn't hear me. _I couldn't save them. Only they can._

I sneaked past the countless hallways, pulling out the layout plan information from my mind. I avoided the guards since I didn't have a lot of time to start a killing spree, Nishikawa's head takes priority before anyone could discover that one of their own was dead like a rock.

Suddenly, I stopped after I took a turn and hid behind a corner. According to the Kunoichi's information, I just needed to walk to the end of this wall way and turn left, then I would see Nishikawa's room. However, one more step, and then I will be in the range of the sensor. He is someone I had to kill in order to complete the mission. Having a sensor who had sensed your chakra signature chasing you was like playing hide and seek with Shun. You simply don't.

I took a deep breath and composed myself, whether I succeed or fail depended on this try. I hid a kunai in my sleeve and walked out the corner bravely. I could almost felt my own suppressed chakra signature being sucked up by another. Instead of rushing to the sensor, I paced around. I walked back and forth, in a slightly rushed step and my footwork showed my panic. According to the kunoichi, Nishikawa usually had two guards guarding his door, and fighting a sensor with another beside him was a messy situation. All I needed to do is draw the sensor out.

I paced a little closer until I could hear the guard's exchanges. "I sensed someone." One of them said. "Who is it?" "I don't know, it's someone new" "Then alert the Master, we might have an attacker." I drew a breath, almost ready to draw the kunai and slash their throats. "No, it's too undeveloped to be a shinobi, it's probably a civilian. I'll take care of it, maybe someone got lost, I felt the signature pacing in a circle." I relaxed and pushed my kunais back into my sleeves.

"Yo, what's going on here, why are you wandering? This area is off-limits." one of the guards - the sensor - walked towards me quickly as he scolded me harshly. Once he saw my childlike stature and my panicked steps, his muscle relaxed.

Three meters, two meters, "Thank god someone is here, I think I got lost, this house is just so big." One meter. "Seriously, there should have been someone with you." Zero. I reached for his arm, lightning chakra buzzing from my fingers. His eyes widened just as my fingers wrapped around his wrist.

His body stopped moving for a second from the paralysis of the concentrated lightning chakras. I pulled him down, and he fell down towards me. My other hand already flipped the kunai out, like a hug, I let him fell into my arms. Then, I stabbed the base of his neck, plunging the sharp kunai into his brain stem. A rush of lightning chakra filled the kunai and rushed into his neck. A second later, he was dead without even letting out a scream. His body stayed lifeless in my arm, in a cradle of death.

Quickly, I placed his body on the floor, there wasn't a lot of blood, but I needed to finish the job before anyone noticed. I studied his face and quickly used a transformation technique to cloak my appearance. Now that the sensor is dead, I could use some chakra without being noticed, at least, for the first little while. I walked calmly toward Nishikawa's room, taking bigger strides to make the transformation seem more natural. As soon as I turned the corner, I could see the other guard and Nishikawa's door about twenty meters away.

"What's going on, who was it?" The remaining guard asked, keeping his voice down so he wouldn't bother his master. _Loyal shinobi_ , I thought, _I wonder what made him so loyal, charisma or money?_

I didn't answer him because by the time he realized something was abnormal with me, I was already in front of him, red eyes staring at him. His body froze under the genjutsu. Then, as if he was a robot, his body dropped slowly and awkwardly until he was lying on the ground, unconscious. I didn't hesitate when I crouched down and slashed his neck. The blood was flowing by my feet as I turned towards the closed door. Only one more left.

I could see past the thin door and tell the chakra behind it. Nishikawa was sitting by his desk, quietly and peacefully. Either he was oblivious to what's happening outside, or he was so confident that even if his guards were killed, I wouldn't able to kill him. I'd pick the latter, he was a jonin after all.

I crashed straight into the door dodging an incoming sword to my head on my way in. There was no point in hiding, he had already found me out. I lowered my body as Nishikawa stabbed his sword at me, then I slid on the floor towards his knees. He raised his leg, ready to kick me, but I tilted his direction with a throw of the kunai. I dodged his kick and grabbed his right leg, twisting it with my chakra enhanced hands. There was a crack, a scream and the man fell down. He was a jonin, yes, but he retired ten years ago and started to luxuriously enjoy life with his 'earned' wealth. Compared to himself, his legions of shinobi followers were much more formidable.

As he fell, I got up and grabbed his sword hand and with a jolt of lightning, the sword fell from his hands. Following through with the momentum, I dragged his arm up with me as I did a backflip and landed in front of him. His arm has just been twisted in a whole circle, and when I let go of it, it felt limply by his side as he dropped to the ground with a broken knee.

"You… assassins. Where are you from?" He huffed as he stared at me venomously, all his kind charisma gone in an instant.

"None of your concern. You know, I thought I'd give you a quick death seeing as you were such a philanthropist, but then, I saw the children," I said emotionlessly. In a flash, I stepped in front of him and slashed his neck with a kunai. I was careful with the strike, deep enough that it would damage the trachea, but shallow enough so that he wouldn't die right away. He gripped his neck with his other hand, but he couldn't speak.

"Human trafficking, I guess that was your main business, right? You didn't care what they would become so long as you got the money. Slaves, prostitutes… killers." My eyes darkened as I said the last word. The man just gurgled in response as his blood flowed down his hands into a pool under him.

"The Land of Grass would be better without you," I whispered. The pattern in my eyes changed, the three tomoes turning into three petals with three black shades. I pushed the chakra into my right eye and stared at Nishikawa's body. Instantly, a ball of black flame sprouted on his chest, and it burned and burned no matter how hard he shook and convulsed in pain.

Amaterasu, the eternal black flame that will purge whatever it touched until there was nothing left. I let it touch Nishikawa, and now he was a pile of nothingness. The fire only burned for five seconds, because there was so little to burn.

When I dispelled Amaterasu along with the mangekyou sharingans, I felt a wave of dizziness rushing up to my head. For something I had never practiced before, the first try wasn't that bad. Usually, my assassination would be over a million years ago, but I dragged it just a bit too long (even if I was trying to intentionally attract some attention). Oops, I let my emotions get the better of me and now I need to leave before I was killed for my decision.

The dizziness was gone quickly, my chakra reserve was not that small that they would be exhausted after one use of Mangekyou, however, it was pretty much halved. Between the few mind control genjutsus and the Amaterasu, I used my sharingan way too much today. I closed my right eye to let it rest, feeling the metal tasting liquid dripping down my cheek.

Chaos quickly ensued when I left Nishikawa's room. Like I said, Nishikawa's legion of shinobi was more formidable than him, and they were chasing me. I ducked into the hallway to my right as waves of shurikens were flung at me.

I quickly ran through the mind map in my head. I was on the second floor, and I still needed to get through eight hallways and one set of stairs before I could leave the villa, all the while leading the shinobi away from that room of children. I still had to get past tons of shinobi throwing jutsus at me as well as figure out how to get away once I was out of the gate. _This sucks, and Kakashi sucks._ I knew full well that this was probably not all his fault, but I couldn't blame it on the children, and this was probably not a good time for self-reflection either, so Kakashi it was.

I jumped on the wall to avoid being hit by a bunch of water bullets, then I heard screams from the hall in front of me. They were closing in on me from both sides, I figured they'd predict my path after some time, but not this soon. I had one sword on me that I picked up from Nishikawa, and I could perhaps perform another Mangekyou technique. Kannon Bosatsu was out of the question, casting one on this many shinobi would kill me before it saves me. _Do I really need to use Amaterasu to burn my way out of here?_ I thought with annoyance. That was one way for me to stay alive, but it would probably burn everyone inside and destroy the stealth aspect of the mission, not that it wasn't endangered already.

Surprisingly, I wasn't as afraid as I should be, considering I was about to be killed any minute. Yes, I was annoyed at my predicament and Kami help me if I ever see that kid who triggered my dark side again, but the acute fear of death waned a bit. What replaced it was a small bit of...thrill.

Suddenly, I felt someone grabbed my right wrist and pull me into a small corridor on my right. I couldn't see who it was since my right eye was still closed for recovery, but still, I felt nothing on my right until someone grabbed me. So I panicked and send a jolt of electricity down my right arm, hoping whoever it was will let go.

I heard a wine before a familiar sound calmed me down, "Stop struggling, I'm bailing you out of here." Kakashi pulled me along towards some escape route only he knew. Somehow, the amount of shinobi chasing me was smaller, clearly, they couldn't predict wherever the hell my captain was taking me.

Quickly, I realized he was running towards the balcony, not the gate. Before I could ask any questions, he was already zig-zagging like running in a maze. Somehow, he knew the villa better than I do, and he was successful in shaking off our pursuers with his unpredictable routes.

"Jump!" He yelled at me as we arrived at the balcony. I looked down from the railing and saw the outdoor pool under it. I wasn't moving for a second, but Kakashi was. He jumped down from the railing and dragged me along with him like a dead sack of potatoes, and then we plunged into the water.

I was so _not_ prepared when I was dumped into the water. I could feel the cold water numbing my body, threatening to drown my senses and pull me into unconsciousness. _There it is, the feeling that pulled me back into the fear of death._ I almost panicked and screamed out because I was freaking _suffocating,_ but very faintly, I could also feel Kakashi's hand clamped around my arm the whole time, dragging me to somewhere. There was a minor tremble, and then I was really washed away by the current, towards somewhere unknown.

Finally, I felt I was being dragged out from a hole and I flopped onto the ground immediately, letting the grounded feeling sink into my body. I pushed myself up weakly and coughed the water out.

"Still alive?" I heard someone beside me asking. It was Hound. It was Kakashi.

I coughed some more before I had enough air to speak. "Fine, just fine. What happened to all those shinobi chasing us, where are we..." I couldn't help but shoot out questions, I felt vulnerable, I felt unsafe.

"Easy… I said I would get you out, didn't I?" I turned my head towards the voice, seeing the same hound mask I've been seeing for ages. I looked around, seeing the hole in the ground with the wet soil surrounding it. I suddenly realized, he prepared a tunnel on the side of the pool before hand. By using a simple Earth ninjutsu, he blasted the hole open and the water current pushed us through the tunnel. That was actually a genius plan, so much better than my run-for-the-gate-like-an-idiot plan.

"I collapsed the tunnel once we got in, and I left a fake trail beforehand to the opposite direction. We should get moving, it's still far away from the border." He explained to me calmly. Then, he got up quickly, gave me a hand and pulled me up.

"What were you thinking? Making a commotion when you could have gotten out without anyone noticing." I averted my eyes quickly as Kakashi asked with mild anger in his voice. _I guess it was too much hope for him not to notice._

"Um...I panicked." Yep, that was the best answer I could come up with.

"And? What would happen if I hadn't been there? Slaughter the whole villa?" Okay, maybe it was a bit more than mildly angry.

"But you said you would be there." See, I was trying to use his words against him, he did say that he would take care of the escape plan. I was hoping that with my slightly dazed mentality at the moment, he would just let this go.

With a loud sigh, he eyed me with frustration, as if deciding whether I am annoying or very annoying (probably the latter). Eventually, he shook his head lightly and started walking.

I stood there for a moment until Kakashi turned around and stared at me like I was an idiot. Quickly, I understood that he was expecting me to follow him. _So he wasn't planning on leaving me here for a night to reflect on my impulsive mistake._

"So you basically dug a hole for the whole night?" I changed the topic quickly.

"Not me, my summons. I just relaxed all night, sleeping." He retorted with his usual laziness and I just cocked my head and gave him a 'Really?' expression. There was no way he just slept all night, he scouted the scene, memorized the villa floor plans, prepared a fake trail and hid out of sight to pull me out. I may be the one that executed the assassination, but he was the one that ensured my safety and the completion of the mission.

"Summons?" I asked with curiosity. I had heard of them before, animal companions that form contracts with shinobi. But they were so rare that I had never seen them before.

"Summoning technique!" Kakashi actually performed the summoning in front of me. After a poof, a small pug appeared. It was wearing a navy ninja vest as well as a Konoha headband on its head.

"Pakkun, how's the patrol?" Kakashi asked the ninken as I watched curiously.

"They followed the fake trail. Border patrol team reported no trouble, we can move out now." Despite its cute and small appearance, the ninken's voice was deep and rich. After he reported to Kakashi, he tilted his head slightly towards me and asked: "Kakashi, who is this, your young pup?"

"She's my subordinate," Kakashi answered flatly, with much unwillingness to admit it. I stared at the pug, its fur just looked so soft, and I wanted to ruffle it just like with Sasuke's hair. See, now that Sasuke was in some kind of rebellious phase, he refused to accept the role of children, nor did he feel like letting me touch his hair.

"He's adorable. I want to rub his fur." I muttered automatically before I realized what I said. Immediately, I covered my mouth with my hands, but it was too late, both Kakashi and the pug - Pakkun - were staring at me.

Kakashi looked at me as if he couldn't believe what he heard. I don't blame him, words like 'adorable' were not on my normal vocabulary list. However, I would definitely blame it on the fatigue and the nearly-drowned experience.

"She's a funny one, I like her, Kakashi. But we need to get moving before they come searching." Pakkun laughed and he hurried us to keep moving. Kakashi followed the pug and I followed him. Suddenly, he threw something at me and I caught the incoming objects swiftly - they were my twin swords and my rabbit mask.

"Take care of your own weapons now and put on your mask." He ordered, but his voice seemed less authoritative. Immediately, I strapped the swords on my back and placed the Anbu mask on my face even though I knew that it conceal nothing.

"Yes, Captain." _Weapons and this false sense of anonymity, they are my saviours._

As I ran away from the villa now all lit up from the chaos, I wondered if those children had gotten out or not. See, I didn't really want to help them, not when all I could do was giving them a false sense of hope.

What would they do even if they got out? They had been taken by Nishikawa exactly because they were orphans, therefore no one would care about their disappearances. Between all the violence and pillage in the Land of Grass, their chance of survival was as low as it gets.

The Land of Grass was really not a good destination for tourism right now, or anytime for that matter.

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A/N: I don't think any place in the Naruto world is good for tourism...but thanks for reading this chapter! I like constructive criticisms, I really do. Like I said, the goal is to improve my writing in general. So if you have time, I would really appreciate it!

Next update is a week from now, on next Saturday ^_^


	19. Chapter 19 - Not My Fault

A/N: I come bearing gift...two reasons why I'm updating: 1, I wasn't actually going to continue writing this chapter, because I got stuck in like the first 1000 words. But, my beta sat me through and we laughed the whole way as I was writing this. Before I know it, I had already finished this one and moved onto the next chapter (Besides, this chapter is mostly pretty chill...so no need to keep you guys waiting for a week). 2. I need to apologize because I need to delay the next update by a day or two since I am being whisked away this weekend to somewhere with no internet access. So no internet = no posting until late Sunday or early Monday. So take this as an afternoon tea read that fills your time, and a gift for an apology.

Beta'd by Alice J.

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Chapter 19 - Not My Fault

I was alone in locker room 15, staring at my locker, deciding if I should go home. Kakashi had already gone immediately after the mission debrief and none of my other teammates have been summoned for a mission yet.

I opened the locker, and then I closed it. I opened it again, ready to pull out my normal clothes, but then I pulled back my hand and slammed the locker door close. There was a loud 'bang', but no one was in the room to wince about it. _I am a coward, I am even too scared to face him, even though he is the only family I have left. Sasuke will be disappointed if I don't return, but he will be more disappointed if I did._

Eventually, I did reopen the locker again, but instead of grabbing the normal clothes for the off days, I grabbed the black shirt and pants issued by Anbu. I was not ready to go home yet, so I would stay a bit longer in here. It was like a second home here anyway. After the quick change, I took out a small notebook in my locker first before slamming the door shut again.

The notebook of my enigma, I thought as I sat on the bench and flipped the notebook open to a new page. There were scribbles in the pages before it, mostly notes about what I felt wasn't right during the Uchiha massacre, like how Itachi was able to eliminate all the Uchihas in the compound and the police station by himself in one night; like how my parents, especially my prideful father, put down his resistance and accepted death by the hands of his own son; like how despite our huge difference in power, Itachi let me and Sasuke live.

I wrote on the new page "Itachi was in Team Ro before 13, then he was selected as a Captain and re-assigned." These were tiny bits of information that I hoped will make the enigma clear, but all they were doing was increasing the number of unanswered questions.

I flipped a few pages and arrived at some previous notes. This one had a huge question mark in the center of the page. At the top, it read "Why would Father die willingly and claim it was something Itachi had to do?" Obviously, the clan massacre would have never been Father's idea. Uchiha Fugaku may not be many things, but he was definitely one thing: the protector of his clan, the one who puts his clan higher than anything else. Yet, he allowed his own clan be massacred, decimated to only two children with his own son as the criminal. I couldn't see how that will benefit the clan. The only things left in that massacre were Sasuke, me, and an empty Uchiha title. _Why? Am I missing something, or had I simply not known him well enough._

So what was Father looking for, our survival? Did he make a deal with Itachi to spare our lives if he and mom surrendered? Putting the life of his children before the life of his clan, would he really do it? I seemed biased, I was biased.

Another reason for him to accept it would be if he realized that the Uchiha clan was dead no matter what. But how? Did he arrive too late? Was he overpowered? Like I said, it was an enigma, so many variables, so much mystery.

I flipped onto the next page, there were only two words on it, "Shisui" and "Itachi". The whole basis of Itachi's success in the massacre lay in his Mangekyou Sharingan. I realized after I obtained it, that the power of Mangekyou was frightening. The cause of his evolution was…

I wrote mangekyou under Itachi's name and then drew an arrow towards Shisui. It was his death that caused the evolution, it was his death that guaranteed the success of the massacre.

Itachi wasn't stupid, he must have known he couldn't beat the whole clan without his mangekyou, and I would never believe the idea that Itachi killed his best friend. That left two possibilities, either Shisui intentionally committed suicide for Itachi's sharingan to activate, or that his death was caused by some unforeseen circumstances and the activation of mangekyou was coincidental.

Of those two possibilities, the first one suggested that the planning of massacre was way before Shisui's death and that Shisui was in league with Itachi. The second one suggested that Itachi only planned the massacre after Shisui's death, which was only one day earlier than the massacre. Either way, Shisui's death changed everything, the motivation, the success and the outcome.

I drew a circle around Shisui's name, he was the precursor and I didn't even know how he died. And _that_ was the biggest enigma. Suicide, no body found, none of those conditions were normal.

Especially his eyes.

" _Ah, Hime, that's a secret. I'll tell you my Mangekyou if you got yours. But for now, it's best if you don't know, the Mangekyou Sharingan is a curse."_ He told me once before and I never knew of his abilities. My instinct screamed at me that the ability of his eyes was important, but in what way, I didn't know.

Enigma, enigma, enigma. Everything was so complicated. Itachi had a purpose, he wouldn't be on a killing spree out of insanity, he was stronger than that. That meant, I was missing something, I always was. I had never found enough pieces to make sense of the enigma. It was as if Itachi and Shisui set me up for a huge maze, but they sealed the exit and threw away the key.

Out of pure rage, I threw the notebook towards the wall and it made an ugly sound of crashing before it fell down. I was dazed for a moment before I decided that I need to go pick it up. I walked slowly towards the fallen notebook and picked it up in an almost automatic motion.

When I returned to the bench, I laid on it just like I always did during my recruits days. The icy cold metallic touch often helped with the nerves and migraines. I placed the notebook over my chest and I closed my eyes. I was buzzing around like a clueless fly, crashing into glass walls thinking it was the exit. Those idiotic Uchiha boys, they were always having secrets of their own.

See, the whole premise of my plan, or at least a large part of it, was for me to understand Itachi's actions. I thought I would understand it if I just live it once; I thought I could see what he was seeing.

But I couldn't. I just couldn't.

They all said that the biggest struggle in Anbu was not the difficulty of missions, but that of heart. As black ops, we had to do things that were considered to be the moral gray zone. I assassinated political officials, killed foreign leaders, and blew up military bases. Just take Nishikawa's assassination for example, it wouldn't matter whether he was collecting the children to give them a job or to sell them to human traffickers, the end results would be the same. I would have to kill them.

The only difference was that if he was a wrongdoer, then it would make my conscience easier. However, as for my conscience...I didn't even know if I have them anymore. Emotions, yes, no matter how hard I tried to deny it, it was there. A line that I didn't cross, maybe. But conscience...I honestly didn't know. It was like that my conscience was so skewed and numbed before I even came to Anbu that I couldn't feel whether or not Anbu was changing me.

I didn't know what Itachi was feeling. He would saw the moral dilemma, he would saw the struggle between mission and conscience, but I had no idea how that would affect him. He was different than most people, but he was also different from me. _What would Itachi do? Wait, I know that. Based on his flawless records, he completed all of them. It was the question of what he would feel, what he would think._ In this area, I was truly, wholeheartedly beaten by Shisui. How did Itachi feel about Anbu? How did he feel about _his life_ in Anbu?

Konoha Anbu was definitely different from OLYMPUS, I established that very quickly when I entered. You see, it wasn't the job that was different, they were pretty much the same thing. The same kind of job that involved mostly of people that needed to die; the same kind of job I excelled at.

It was the idea that I was treated as a _human,_ a shinobi for my village. They wouldn't discard me for the slightest mistake. Sandaime made it clear that there were therapists for me if I needed them, and if I wanted to walk away from this life, I could.

Compared to OLYMPUS, Anbu was a bargain I couldn't refuse. It offered me a place to use the skill I was most familiar with, a place where I was needed. However, it also took away my greatest fear: the feeling of being trapped. It was not completely free, but it was enough to make me feel like I belong.

It was scary. It was really scary because I liked it here, but I didn't believe Itachi would, therefore I couldn't understand him. Was he driven crazy by all these killings? Was he feeling trapped? Was he fighting his own conscience every second of the day? He was too different from me, while my moral could be considered in the gray zone, he was so kind, the kindest person I thought I would ever meet. Not in the way most people would see kindness, not like a philanthropist. He killed people, but only to survive, only to protect.

He was my hero. Or at least, he had been.

Anbu changed him, ever since he stepped into this place - the place that should be viewed as Hell even though it was becoming more and more like a second home - he became lost to me.

For the first time, I truly felt like that I didn't know anything about my brother.

This was the moment when I felt like I should throw that goddamn notebook again just so that the frustration would go smashing into the wall and explode into a billion pieces. _No, the mere notebook is not violent enough, I need something more destructive. Definitely, a healthy way to vent anger out._

I wasn't aiming for anything in particular, no, I just wanted to throw something at the wall so that it would make a loud and _violent_ sound which could potentially make me feel better. It was mostly just muscle memory as I slid out a kunai and flung it at the walls near the door, albeit a bit more forceful than what the delicate Uchiha bukijutsu techniques should be like.

The kunai did make a loud and violent crashing sound as it sailed across room perfectly. However, the moment was ruined when the door opened at the exact same time as the kunai embedded itself by the doorframe.

I got up from the bench immediately to see the cracks forming from the point where the projectile had drilled into the wall with full force, with a certain someone wearing the hound mask standing right next to it.

 _Oh shit._

"So, vandalism of government property or attempted murder?" He asked after a moment of silence as he wrenched the stupid kunai out of the wall, but that just caused more dust and debris to fall from the point of contact.

"Well, if I had planned to murder you, I would hope that my aim to be better than this." A simple "sorry" would have probably sufficed at the moment, but it's true; if I couldn't even hit my target at this distance, that would be really sad.

"Me too. So vandalism then?" But I... couldn't argue with that. After a few seconds of the glaring contest, he threw the kunai back at me which I caught with ease. Eventually, I placed my projectile weapons back into the locker along with the notebook, just to show him that no, I don't plan to vandalize anymore today.

"How long have you been here." He asked, changing the topic at ease as he sat down on one of the benches.

"I don't know, since the Nishikawa's assassination?" I answered uncertainly.

"When was the last time you slept."

"A few hours ago," I said quickly. He glared at me for a moment, and I sighed, "Three days ago."

"And when was the last time you went home?"

"Two weeks ago, but it's none of your business."

"It is my business, I am your captain, and I am supposed to watch the psyche of my subordinates. If you keep being so twitchy and...destructive, I will suspend you until your psyche improves." He said to me coldly and I stared at him unbelievably.

"You can't do that, I'm not crazy."

"I can do that, and just because you are not crazy, which is a debatable subject anyway, it doesn't mean that you are fine. This is Anbu, you adjust or you leave. Go home and see your brother and don't come back until the next mission." Kakashi spoke to me calmly, his hound mask was already off, but the extra layer of mask underneath was obscuring my view for observation.

"I can't go home, I am already a disappointment of a sister to him, I can't disappoint him anymore," I whispered quietly, unsure why I was ranting this to him. He didn't cut me off, so I continued, "Sasuke needs a mother, but I can't be Mom, I can barely be the sister. Every time I come back, I was setting him up for disappointment for when I had to leave…"

"Stop, I am your Captain, not your psychiatrist. Go talk to Inoichi-san or that Yamanaka boy for those problems." Kakashi stopped me quickly. Before I even realized what the hell had happened, he had already pushed me out of the locker room and closed the door behind me.

 _Did he just...kick me out of my natural habitat?_

"Home or therapy sessions, your choice." Vaguely, I heard the lazy voice coming from behind the door. There was no way I would ever go to the therapy sessions from hell, so I guess home then. Honestly, Shun was a horrible pseudo-psychiatrist, so I might actually come back crazier than I was now.

"Home, I choose home. If I come back crazier, I'm going to blame it on you." I yelled at the locked door. When I heard no response, I just shook my head and walked off. _I've been hiding for long enough, time to go home now._

But damn it, I left my keys in there.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"So does anyone want to go take a drink." Everyone in the room slowly turned their head towards the source of the voice.

"What? I'm just suggesting." Falcon threw his hands in the air and muttered. Since technically we were dismissed after a mission, his mask was off, revealing a man in his twenties with curly black locks and a bony face. There was a silence in the locker room and I narrowed my eyes at my teammate, unsure of how to respond. Sure, everyone has a way of coping with stress, for example, Kakashi with his famous novels. But drinking, really?

"Sure, why not, I'm in." Surprisingly, it was Zebra who responded first. The combat medic nin with shoulder length brown hair tied into a small ponytail closed his locker and stared at us expectantly.

"Yeah, okay, let's go." Otter, a beautiful woman with long purple hair, waved her hands casually. I kept quiet as I pulled my vest over my shirt. This vest had an Uchiha Fan insignia on the back.

"Alright, we have three, how about you captain?" Falcon asked with a laugh, clearly hoping to rope Kakashi into saying something crazy while under the influence. However, the Kakashi in my memory would have never been roped into these sorts of stuff.

"You know drinking is not my thing, I'd much rather go somewhere quiet and read my novel," Our captain said casually.

"Come on, Captain, if you go, maybe we can rope Bear into going as well. Don't you like to see what the perfect Bear is like when he is in a drunken state?" Falcon proposed and tilted his head towards the most stoic man on the team, Bear. Over the last year, I've been working in Team Ro, Bear was always a quiet and stoic man. His actions were cautious and he was able to command the team in case of Hound's absence. Unfortunately, no one in the team was blind to his undying admiration to Kakashi's words and action; I would swear that every time Kakashi praised him, he would beam under his mask.

"Actually, that would be somewhat fun to watch. Let's go to a bar, Tenzō." Kakashi looked at Bear, whom he called Tenzō with a smile in his visible eye, and the stoic man shuddered for a split second.

"Senpai! That's not something you should consider as fun." Bear said exasperatedly, but Kakashi just ignored him and agreed to Falcon's proposal. Bear considered arguing for a moment before ultimately giving up.

"Rabbit, how about you? The last member of the team, don't tell me you are bailing." I closed my eyes in pain when I heard the question, and I was just about to sneak out the locker room. I guess this was a lost cause, considering the fact that Falcon was a sensor.

"Falcon, I hope you do realize that I am only thirteen." I turned around and said, eyeing the man unimpressed. There was a certain glint in his eyes that spoke of mischief and I mentally alerted myself against it.

"But we are shinobi, age doesn't matter, you are practically an adult," Falcon argued. I sighed, suddenly realized that there weren't any laws in this world that said underage drinking was illegal, and he was probably right, the moment we became a chunin, we were seen as responsible adults able to take care of ourselves.

"I am going to see my brother, bye," I said quickly as I prepared to go out, but a hand dragged me back. I turned around furiously and saw Zebra's passive eyes. I closed my mouth to swallow the speech prepared for Falcon because Zebra was not someone I want to argue with.

"How old is your brother?" He asked, and I gave him a strange look.

"Eight, why does it have to do with anything?"

"Is he enrolled in Academy?"

"Yes, again, any reason why you are asking?"

"It's one in the morning right now, and tomorrow is a school day, are you really going to wake your brother up in the middle of the night before a school day?" Zebra inquired calmly, slowly letting his words sink in. I opened my mouth to answer, but then I closed it out of the lack of words because I seriously did not think this through. _Okay, maybe I was actually planning to destroy some trees in my spare time until my brother is awake, but that's vandalism, isn't it?_

"I don't think so." He answered for me and I glared at him, speechless.

"Haha, no more excuses. Come on, Rabbit, trust me, you are going to love it. Take the advice of an adult." Falcon smirked at me, and I got an unsettling feeling in my stomach. There was one thing you learned from being in Team Ro: during missions, Falcon was as efficient as a hawk, but during the off times, well, he tends to be a bit wacko.

"I'm not drinking. I'm serious." I said with a newfound determination and Falcon just laughed my statement off.

"Sure whatever, let's just get to the bar!"

 _What in the world is happening…._

…

"Look around, kid, there's still a lot you need to learn." Falcon laughed as he dragged us into one of the sketchy bars that were still lit up at this hour.

"So you are admitting I am a kid now, good, does that mean I can go now?"

"I say that more as an expression than the actual meaning. Excuse me! Can we take the order please!" Falcon yelled as my team squeezed into the booth. I was stuck between Falcon and Zebra, which meant I had no way of to sneak out. Kakashi was sitting across from me, with Bear and Otter by his sides. Kakashi looked bored since he already took out his favorite 'romantic comedy' novel. Bear tried to look as stoic and calm as ever, but I could tell his discomfort in being in a bar.

I placed my head in my hands as I heard Falcon ordered a few bottle of sake and the waiter answered with a grunt.

"Not a sociable person here, are you?" I heard Zebra asking besides me and I tilted my head to face the medic-nin.

"I just don't like the idea of drinking, I don't want to be drunk when I have to go home," I muttered. Just thinking about the chance of my brain turning into mush and doing something stupid was sad. Although there was always the slim chance that my body was born alcohol resistant, but I was not going to test it here.

"Tell us something about you that we can embarrass you about. You see Otter there, we always tease her about her boyfriend," Otter scowled as Falcon pointed at her, "and Bear over there, he is the easiest to tease, all you have to do is mention 'Captain' and wait for a reaction." Bear gave Falcon a cold, dead glare with his wood-carved face, "Then there's me, hell, everything about me is laughable." _At least you admit it…_ I noticed he didn't say anything about Kakashi and Zebra, which made sense since the two people that you don't ever want to get on the bad side of are the Captain and the medic.

"I'm not sure I want to tell you now that you explained it. Besides, my life really is no fun, eventful maybe, but definitely not fun." I uttered quietly, hoping he'd drop the topic.

"Then tell us about your brother, you always use him as an excuse to leave, it's hard not to get curious," Zebra added not so subtly. I narrowed my eyes at my teammates, wondering what the hell was this suspicious info session.

"What is this, my psych evaluation?" I asked as I glared at Kakashi, who resolved to turn his face away from me. "Hey, Tenzō, want to try this amazing romantic comedy?" "No! I mean, thank you senpai, but I don't think this is for me."

"Fine, he was an adorable little kid, well, he still is, just with some bits of problems. My brother is emotionally unstable and socially withdrawn. He has a superiority complex towards others because of his clan education, but he has an inferiority complex when being compared with his clan legacy. Right now, he has tunnel vision and his only motivation is revenge driven. Using his pseudo- psychiatrist's words, he is 'a little twisted and emotionally broken, maybe, but he will be fine'. Does that answer your question." I articulated in a serious voice, waiting for my teammates' reactions. At first, there was silence, then Otter laughed. Soon, everyone is laughing, even Bear.

"Geez, she is a funny one. No offense, but that sounds like most Uchihas to me…" Otter started with a laugh, but she quickly closed her mouth with a glare from Zebra. _Ah, they were being careful with the Uchiha massacre._

"You are right, but that mostly applies to Uchiha men. My mother wasn't like that, and someone please knock me out if I ever become like that." I said lightheartedly in order to break the tension in the room.

"I think you are halfway there, emotionally unstable, check; socially withdrawn, check." Falcon laughed beside me as he made check marks with his hands in the air and a few chuckles followed.

Finally, the dreaded moment arrived when the waiter came with the sake and cups. "This brand of sake is amazing. Who wants a drink! Of course, everyone wants a drink!" Falcon celebrated loudly as he proceeded to fill the cups with alcohol. I could already smell the staggering stench of the alcohol floating in the booth, starting to dull my senses. Yeah, this body was definitely not naturally born alcohol resistant, if anything, this body was very weak against it. One day I'm going to have to build up alcohol resistance for different missions, but not now.

"Let's play a game of 'listing out Rabbit's embarrassing moments'! It's the tradition for rookies here!" _No, let's not do that, and what kind of stupid tradition is this?_ I wanted to protest to Falcon's stupid suggestion, but before I could do that, the list was already underway.

"Oh, remember when you woke up exactly three hours in the middle of the desert, down to the second?" _Not my fault..._

"I know, when you burned down that cottage a few months ago, not that I have any objections, but the police officials certainly did. What was the excuse you used? Cooking accidents?" _I don't even know what to say..._

"You know that large crack in the locker room?" "Wait, she did that?" _Speechless…_

"Let's not forget about that pathetic attempt at Chidori last year." _..._

And the list continued.

 _This is becoming a secret dump, why is this a secret dump! I thought people here care about that confidentiality crap!_ I buried my head even deeper into my hands if that was possible. Unfair, half of it wasn't even my fault.

"Want some water?" I heard Zebra's calm voice when he handed me a cup of clear liquid. I didn't think too much at that moment since Zebra was usually responsible, and I was really getting a headache because of the stuff I heard. I gulped down the liquid in the cup and looked up again. Bear was staring at me shocked while Otter and Falcon snickered. Immediately, I looked down at my cup, trailing my eyes to Zebra who avoided my gaze and then I remember the unnatural taste in my cup of 'water'.

"You laced it with alcohol!?" I screamed at Zebra.

"I didn't lace it, it was pure alcohol." He spoke in a completely detached voice. Suddenly, I felt betrayed, very, very betrayed. I didn't get to throw stuff at him because I could already feel my head spinning dizzily under the effect of alcohol.

 _This is a bond-breaking moment,_ I repeat, my last bits of good faith towards my teammates disappeared like dust in the wind.

…

Kakashi watched as his prodigious pupil gulped down the cup of sake in a panic. He should have warned her, but he didn't. Yes, he wanted his subordinates to relax a bit, he could see her being crushed by all the heavy burdens on her shoulder. No matter how natural or efficient Maiko was, the work schedule in Anbu was not easily adjusted, especially if she had attachments outside of Anbu that was clearly causing half of her problem.

"Damn, never thought Zebra could pull it off." Falcon exclaimed, "You are such a good liar, saying it so calmly without even a smirk." Zebra just shrugged at Falcon's compliment.

"Pay up," Zebra said to Falcon calmly. Yes, Kakashi might or might not have been aware of a bet going around here. Honestly, he had no idea what she would become when she was drunk. He had no reference as to how much alcohol an Uchiha could take since Itachi never came on these occasions. He had to admit, it was one of his guilty curiosities that made him agree to Falcon's crazy idea.

"Sorry, my bad, I handed you the wrong drink, this is the water for clearing your head." Zebra wasn't finished, he calmly picked up another cup of sake and shamelessly passed it to the dizzy girl.

"Captain, I think we really need to teach her how to overcome the effect of alcohol with chakra. I mean, look at her, she's literally a poor little rabbit amidst wolves." Otter warned him in a voice with a mixture of amusement and worry. The woman had taken a liking to the young girl since both of them were female with a knack for kenjutsu.

Kakashi eyed the scene across the table; true to Otter's words, Maiko looked like a clueless rabbit stuck between two wolves giving her more drinks claiming it was water. See, it was Falcon's suggestion, and his only motivation was to see how the perfect Uchiha gene reacted to alcohol since he never got to find out when Itachi was on the team. He sighed, realizing how bad of an idea it was to actually listen to Falcon's suggestion, because if they weren't in a shinobi bar and if he weren't here to keep things in check, his team would have been reported as soliciting underage drinking, not that age meant much here, considering how young she started in the business of killing.

"Alright, back it off, I think she's had enough for the day." Kakashi finally decided to take control of the situation, before anything unexpected happen. The extent of his plan was supposed to be team bonding _, not_ drinking. The girl would loosen up a bit under the pressure and she will sleep for a sound day before going on another painfully long mission.

"Come on, Captain, she is so much more fun when she's drunk." Falcon poked the confused girl in the head, and instead of breaking his arm like what usually happened, the girl just giggled.

Perhaps'giggled' was not the right word to use. It was more like a childish laughter laced with madness. _A child. A crazy child,_ Kakashi thought immediately. _A crazy child with a reason to be crazy._ Kakashi thought the madness was her way of telling him that she was frustrated. Frustrated beyond belief, but she had no way of saying it. So she laughed in madness and absurdity.

Kakashi winced as he looked away, he had officially starting to regret it. He wondered what kind of madness he was spiralling into. Before today, before he had seen this, it was so much easier to disregard the fact that his prodigious pupil was only thirteen, still only a child. It was so much easier to beat the living daylights out of her during training without holding back; so much easier to exploit her every potential like a war machine without feeling the guilt; so much easier to converse with her like she was a dangerous threat from the enemy without letting his guard down. She was always so rational to the point that Kakashi sometimes questioned if she had a heart; to the point that he felt unsettling. This was madness, he confirmed one more time.

Eventually, the laughter ran dry. Maiko leaned her head back into the seat and covered her face with her hands. For a second, Kakashi thought she would just snap. Snap under the pressure, snap under the frustration. Maybe she finally decided to accept the flood and let it drown her. _This is bad,_ Kakashi thought, but he couldn't for the life of him think of what to do about it.

He couldn't stop the flood, the stream of problems. All he could do was lifting her from the river and he wasn't sure how many times he could do it. He wasn't even sure it was relieving the problems because she would eventually just fall again and struggle against the current. _After all, that's what normal people do, don't they?_

So, was she drowning?

Kakashi thought she was, that was, until he saw her reaching her hand into Falcon's grasp and snatched away his cup of sake. As everyone watched with shock eyes, she drank in a slow but calm motion. There was a bit of sorrow and a lot of fatigue in her eyes, but Kakashi had expected that. However, Kakashi thought the alcohol would drown out the clarity in her eyes, but apparently not. It was almost as if she decided that there was nothing she could do, so she just bravely went with the waves.

So, was she drowning? Or was she swimming? Or at least, trying to swim?

"Ne, Kakashi-taichou, can I see Pakkun?" His attention was snapped back by Maiko's voice. He stared at the young girl, who stared back at him expectantly. He was very aware of the glares his teammates gave him, was he seriously going to use a summoning technique to please the whims of a drunk subordinate? Apparently, his teammates thought the answer was yes. With a sigh, he bit his finger to draw the blood and placed his hand on the table.

"Summoning technique." He muttered lazily, then there was a small poof and his loyal partner appeared in front of him looking confused.

"Kakashi, what do you need?" Pakkun inquired with his usual deep voice. The pug's eyes wandered a bit, then he looked at Kakashi as if saying "What the hell?". Kakashi motioned Pakkun towards the drunk girl.

"Kakashi, what did you do to the poor girl?" Pakkun gave him an accusing look as he strode over to Maiko, who picked him up immediately and placed him on her lap. Kakashi tried really hard to decide what to answer between his team's snickers.

"She's a little bit… under the influence. And she said she wanted to see you." He answered quickly, silently deciding Falcon was going down in the next group training session. To his relief, his ninken companion just shrugged and started to snuggle up to the girl with his furry body.

"You wanted to see me, pup?" Pakkun asked the girl with his deep voice that contrasted with his cute appearance, but Kakashi wasn't sure if the girl was sane enough at the moment to answer.

"Yeah, Pakkun's fur is so soft, like a pillow, and you are so adorable. Sasuke used to be cute like this until he became an angry little otouto." Maiko muttered quietly as she hugged Pakkun near her chest and stroked his fur gently. She looked like she was about to fall asleep, which Kakashi wouldn't be surprised.

"Kakashi, she needs to go home," Pakkun warned as Kakashi sighed. Despite the tone of disapproval Pakkun used, Kakashi clearly saw him purring comfortably in the girl's hug and enjoying the little attention. Out of a sheer headache, Kakashi grabbed a cup of sake and drank it down. He closed his eyes in an attempt to remember where the girl lived. Right, with that Yamanaka boy in one of the apartment buildings near the entrance of Konoha.

"Party's over, at least for me and Rabbit. I'm taking her home, and don't cause any trouble." He said as he tapped Maiko on the shoulder. Obediently, she followed him like a little puppy. There was a chorus of "Yes, Captain" behind him as he followed Pakkun out of the bar.

It was around three in the morning when he sent the girl home. Kakashi walked her home just to make sure that she didn't turn the wrong way and fall into a ditch. However, he had to actively check behind him just to make sure she was still following him because she was so silent.

When they arrived at the apartment building, Kakashi stared at the tall building for a few minutes trying to remember which floor it was. Finally, he pulled out that tiny detail from his memory and realized that he should probably ask for keys, so he waved his hands in front of her to get her attention. He got no response.

Ah, she fell asleep. He swears that she just fell asleep in the short period of time they were standing still. Or maybe she was already sleepwalking? Probably not, since she followed him instead of trailing off to some abandoned forest. Kakashi had to quickly snatch the back of her shirt to keep her from falling to the ground face first.

 _What happened to all the alertness she always had?_ Kakashi wondered, but it was kind of comical. So yes, this was definitely going on her 'list of embarrassing moments' and it would probably be the highlight for the next ten years or so (it was a tradition, established right after she had joined).

But damn it, he still needed the keys.

After a few minutes of thinking (while _she_ dozed off without a care in the world), he just dragged her up the window like a sack of potatoes. Her traps were way too easy to avoid for a jonin like him, one of these days, he would have to talk to her about it.

The room was dark, whoever lived here was clearly sleeping soundly. Kakashi wanted to drop the girl and go, get rid of the trouble and disappear like he always did. But somehow, he couldn't just drop her in the darkness and expect her to pick up the pieces.

For the millionth time in the last three hours, he sighed. He extended his arm and held the girl up by her collar - like how a dog would pick up a tiny stupid puppy - so that she could actually stand on her feet. There was a loud grunt signifying that she was awake again, probably feeling nausea and headache from the alcohol and the roller coaster experience up the window.

Within one minute, there was muffling sound in one of the rooms and a certain Yamanaka burst out of the door. Kakashi had nothing to say when the seventeen-year-old glared at him accusingly, because honestly, he probably deserved it.

He wasted no time in dropping the drunk girl into her roommate's arms. Yamanaka Shun placed Maiko gently on the couch and carefully checked her temperature before he looked up again with anger in his pupil-less sky blue eyes.

"What the hell were you thinking?" The boy was obviously trying his hardest not to yell at him in rage, probably because of the little boy sleeping in the next room. Again, Kakashi had nothing to say, because he had no idea what he was thinking, but he was planning to blame it all on Falcon.

"Nevermind, just leave. If you let her die, I swear I will never forgive you, not again." The teenager cast him another rageful look before turning his attention to the girl on the couch. Kakashi was feeling guilty, but not so guilty that he would say sorry publically. Instead, he turned away and was ready to leave the way he came.

Kakashi couldn't make promises, in the shinobi world, dying young was a common occurrence, this was especially true for Anbu agents. They took on the most dangerous jobs, gave their lives to the Hokage, and yet they receive no glory. He has no idea if Uchiha Maiko would survive until she is twenty, just like how he had no idea that Uchiha Itachi would massacre his whole entire clan. The Uchihas are complicated and unpredictable that way.

So, no, he didn't respond, he simply left. He escaped the living room through the window, but just out of sheer curiosity, he suppressed his chakra as he hung outside the window and looked in.

"Idiot, now what the hell were you thinking? I thought we agreed no more troublesome stuff from you anymore." Now that Maiko was officially awake, the boy wasted no time in reprimanding her.

"Tea. I need some goddamn tea." Maiko grunted demandingly, rubbing her head to ease a headache. It seemed like the effect of alcohol had started to wane once her chakra system started to kick in. However, based on Kakashi's previous experiences, it probably didn't feel so great now that she wasn't sleepy or confused anymore.

"Seriously, at this hour?"

"I am having a blank out for the last one hour or so, and I want to wring some people's necks but that's illegal. So yes, tea please." _Ah, she's back._ Kakashi had no idea how she was already awake enough to make conversation. Maybe it was because of the fact that they were out of the murky environment Falcon dragged them in (yes, he was going to keep blaming that guy); maybe she just had a fast metabolism, which was very likely since those with higher chakra reserves often do.

"Fine, I'll get you some tea." Eventually, the boy gave up.

"I don't know what I did that pissed off Fate and put me on the same team as you. So Kami help me if this becomes a habit…" Very soon, the Yamanaka boy's curses filled the room. Kakashi thought that the Yamanaka boy was taking it rather well but the next sentence he heard definitely proved his point that the Uchihas were born to test other's patience.

"Your tea kinda sucks." Suddenly, the girl sprouted out the words that may or may not have been a retribution to the boy's earlier rant. Shun put down his pot and stared back at Maiko as his eyebrow twitched.

"Do tell me, O-hime-sama, which part of the service doesn't satisfy you?" As Shun asked with the world's most obvious sarcasm, Kakashi wanted to tell him that he really shouldn't push for more unfavourable answers.

"It has no flavour. Always taste like you used the cheapest tea bag and you poured twice the water you are supposed to." For some reason, Kakashi thought it might be true. And judging by the flash of embarrassment on Shun's face, it probably was.

"Well, I bought the tea bags, so I decide how to use them. When you are awake enough, you can go buy your own goddamn tea. Until then, you don't get to complain." With a loud 'thud', the boy placed the cup of diluted tea on the table and went back to get another cup.

"So cheap…"

Finally, Kakashi decided that he was done with being the unqualified guardian for the day, so he left quietly.

One thing became clear from that night with an unexpected turn of events: the formidable Uchiha gene finally met its match with alcohol (although the potential for personality disorder was probably another one).

As for whether she was planning to drown or to swim, only time would tell.

…

For the next month, Falcon's life was a disaster. He regretted two things very dearly in his life, one was training Rabbit so that her speed was on par with his, and two would be ever trying to trick her into drinking sake. He had no idea how many times his shoulders were 'accidentally' dislocated during training sessions, or maybe they were punches to the liver that would hurt just the right amount without actually causing permanent damage. All his teammates sans Rabbit just looked at him silently with pity written in their eyes, even Zebra, whose limbs were saved because he was the only damn good medic on the team. Actually, he regretted three things, the third one being that he chose sensing as his specialty instead of medic ninjutsu.

* * *

A/N: The moral of the story is that be careful of who you hang out with, like really. And also, what goes around comes around, so karma ^_^. So next update will move on to the start of something else because I am so done with the awkward age of 13. Like I said earlier, next update on Sunday or Monday depending on how soon I can access the internet. After this week, the schedule should go back to normal (how I love having a fixed schedule).


	20. Chapter 20 - Prelude

A/N: So, I'm back, with my lovely internet just in time to post this chapter. Anyway, like the title of this chapter suggests, this mini-arc is going to be longer than the usual (around 5 to 6 chapters probably), and this is only the prelude of the mini-story.

* * *

Chapter 20 - Prelude

Time Skip - 15 months later, January (Maiko: 14, Sasuke: 9)

I stood in front of the desolated compound, staring at the dusty Uchiha insignia hanging on the top of the gate. An ancient clan with a powerful kekkei genkai, all of its former glory gone in one night, reduced into a dark part of the forgotten history. Sasuke believed the clan would never be forgotten and that he would restore it to its former brilliance, but I wasn't so sure. Looking at the crumbling buildings and the broken walls in front of me, I knew instantly that it wasn't something that time alone could repair.

"Come on, Sasuke, let's go," I said quietly to my little brother standing behind me. We'd been avoiding coming back here for almost two years, but it's time and we couldn't run forever. Sasuke followed me silently, I wondered if he ever realized that he was so easy to read. His expression was tense and bitter, so full of sorrow and hatred.

So what's left? I thought as I walked into the lifeless compound I once called home. The bodies were all gone, whoever did the cleanup sure did a good job, not even a speck of blood left. But there was other evidence they couldn't erase. The broken stone walls, the slashed open doors, and this heavy sense of death in the air.

"Sasuke, go get anything you need. Be quick, we are not staying long." The boy gave me a small nod before running off in heavy steps. Sasuke needed training scrolls for the Uchiha style taijutsu, genjutsu, and ninjutsu. Especially taijutsu, since he has reached a point where he has exhausted himself in practicing all the previous moves he learned, and I couldn't teach him since I never really learned it well. My taijutsu was something different from the clan's, and even though I offered to teach him mine, he wouldn't change his old style.

I scanned the dusty rooms in the house I used to live in, saying that it was empty was an understatement. All the furniture has been removed, but there were still the scorch marks on the floor and the hole on the wall that reminded me of the pain, the rage and the helplessness I had felt.

I didn't linger any longer, instead, I went straight to my parents' room. Despite the fact my father was the head of the clan, his room was simple and clean. Simple furniture, plain decorations and overall, unspectacular. I didn't know what I would find, father rarely kept anything important in the compound; most of the files and investigations were kept in the Konoha Police Station which had been confiscated by the council after the massacre.

Father… a conflicting character in my life. There was a period I had hated him, for forcing all those things on us, for making us the tools. However, it was only after the massacre that I found out my father never actually filed the official document for exilement; never demanded me to return the Uchiha name or the Uchiha properties. I didn't understand him that much, and I supposed that was because he only ever showed that one side to me except the moment of his death. Had I wronged him, maybe he had reasons? It was not like I hadn't thought about it, but I was acting like a child, a very spoiled child. But I supposed I had paid for that, now that I would never get the chance to know him; to understand him.

I tried to keep the room as clean as possible when I went through the drawers, I didn't want the room to look like someone had broken in after all. Despite all the bloodshed in the living room, none of the bedrooms in the main house seemed to ever have been stained in the same manner. They were dusty, yes, but so peaceful and organized, giving the illusion that nothing had ever happened.

To my disappointment, I couldn't find the things I wanted, Father must have kept all the files in the police station, which I had no access to. However, there was one more place I needed to check. _My last hope,_ I thought bitterly as I exited my parents' room. I turned around the corner of the hallway until I reached a bedroom near the koi pond. Here it was, Itachi's room.

I took a deep breath before I opened the shōji screen. I used to think that those paper doors were so thin that they couldn't keep anything a secret. I was so wrong. It was both relieving and painful to see that my brother's room was just like the way I remembered it. A simple bed where we shared dango together, a simple drawer where he kept all his things, and a simple closet with his clothes and hidden weapons.

I didn't want to move anything in the room, maybe it should just be forever frozen like this. But there was something I needed to find, an answer I wanted to reach no matter what. Reluctantly, I moved my body. I walked over to the drawer first and I pulled open the top most layer. Immediately, my eyes widened at the content of the drawer; it was empty, except for one piece of folded paper.

 _It can't be this easy, it shouldn't_ , I thought with disbelief as I fished the paper out of the drawer. However, when I opened the paper and saw the content, I had to believe it. I found it, Shisui's suicide note.

It was a plain piece of paper, a pure white letter paper with basic black ink. I glossed my fingers over the words, they were no doubt Shisui's handwriting. The funny and optimistic Shisui-senpai, and now he was reduced to just a piece of paper. Silently, I read over the words.

 _I'm tired of the duties..._

 _there is no future for the Uchiha..._

 _and for me..._

 _I cannot walk out the "path" anymore_

I read the words and reread them so many times that I lost count. _What do you mean, Shisui? What are you talking about?_ Shisui had always been a model member of the clan, skillful and dutiful. However, I knew he was different from all those arrogant clan members. He was an optimist and he was Itachi's best friend.

What did he mean by the 'duties'? The clan duties? I knew the rules in the clan and the police department was strict and rigid, but that hardly seemed to be something Shisui would die for. _So what duties were you talking about, Shisui? What did you have to do? Or most likely, what did the clan force you to do?_

What really worried me was the second part, ' _there is no future for the Uchiha… and for me…'._ It almost sounded like… he knew. It sounded like a premonition for what happened, the clan didn't survive, and neither did he. It was so accurate that it scared me like hell. _Did he know about the Uchiha massacre beforehand? Did he plan for this with Itachi? If so, Shisui, did you really commit suicide?_ I wanted to ask him, I wanted to scream at him. But, he wouldn't able to answer, no one could answer me.

"Mai-nee-chan." I almost jumped at the sound of my little brother. Instantly, I turned around and I saw Sasuke's cold eyes. He looked almost… ghostly.

"What are you doing here." He said quietly, with a hint of betrayal in his voice. Right, I was standing in Itachi's room, holding a piece of paper as I dazed around. I probably looked like I was reminiscing about Itachi, the one person he hated the most right now.

"Nothing, I was just… looking for something. Did you get all you need? Let's go then." I smiled at him as I folded the piece of paper in my hands. His eyes trailed after me, or more precisely, my hand as I walked out of the room and closed the shōji door.

"Is that Shisui-nii-san's suicide note?" Suddenly, Sasuke asked. I was stunned for a moment before I turned my attention to him.

"How did you…"

"I saw it once before, the day after Shisui-nii-san died," Sasuke said in a small voice. I stayed silently for a moment, before urging my brother to continue. With a deep breath, Sasuke spoke again, "That day, the day all of this happened, a bunch of clan members came. They were questioning Nii-san. They said Shisui-san had committed suicide, and they said they were investigating his death. They handed Nii-san the suicide note, asking him to give it to Anbu for investigation." He paused a bit before continuing, "They accused him of killing Shisui-nii."

I stopped dead in my tracks, suddenly remembering all of it. When I came to the Uchiha compound looking for answers, some Uchiha clansmen were calling Itachi traitor for killing Shisui. So that's what happened before I came, the fiasco that ended in Itachi kicking everyone's ass.

"Did he really kill…" "No." I stopped Sasuke's question before he could finish it.

"But he had his Mangekyou Sharingan, and he told me that killing your best friend is the only way to gain the Mangekyou!" He yelled at me with anger, betrayal, and confusion mixed in his voice. He was angry at me for putting my unwavering faith in Itachi's innocence, and I couldn't blame him. Sometimes, even I wondered if I was just believing what I wanted to believe.

"That's not the only way to gain the Mangekyou Sharingan, he wasn't telling you the truth," I answered him.

"How would you know!" Unconvinced, he yelled at me again. I didn't answer him immediately, instead, all I did was activate my Mangekyou Sharingan and let the tri-petaled flowers be reflected in his dark eyes.

Sasuke widened his eyes and took a step back. I uttered slowly to him, "The Mangekyou Sharingan is activated by witnessing the trauma of a loved one's death. I activated them when I witnessed the murders of Mom and Father. I know, Sasuke, because I have already experienced the curse." Sasuke was rendered speechless, all he did was stare at my eyes. I didn't deactivate it or close them, I just let him keep on staring. He needed to know, the pain and responsibility of activating the Mangekyou Sharingan.

"Let's go, Sasuke. We should really go." I said to him gently. Quickly, I walked past him, not willing to stay in this place any longer.

"Wait, Nee-chan," Sasuke called me out from behind. Reluctantly, I stopped and turned around.

"Please, teach me how to use the Sharingan." This time, my eyes widened when I saw him staring at me with a pair of red eyes, there was one tomoe present in each of his eyes. _Right, he saw the massacre, how could I be so stupid not to notice._ I laughed bitterly at myself; so finally, the process of using emotional pain to gain power had begun for him.

"I need to be strong, if I am to kill Itachi and protect you, Nee-chan. I was too scared to remember what happened two years ago, and I was afraid to access the Sharingan. But I need power, I need to be strong." The nine-year-old boy in front of me proclaimed as he continued to stare at me with those red eyes.

 _Should I? Or maybe not. He is so young, but then again, when has Sharingan ever waited until one's ready. I guess I need to teach him how to control it, or he would do it himself anyway. It's better that I can supervise him, after all, uncontrolled powers are dangerous, and he needs all he can get to survive._

"Okay, I will teach you, but you can't use it on others carelessly unless I say so," I responded. Sasuke nodded solemnly as he walked up to me so I could hug him under the cold December weather.

"Can we go now, I think we are overstaying our visit," I asked again, and finally, Sasuke nodded and walked with me.

"Nee-chan, I forgot to tell you something. That day when I saw the clan members hand Itachi the suicide note, they said Itachi and Shisui-nii were the only two absent from the clan meeting the night before, that's why they are suspicious of him." Sasuke suddenly said as we left the Uchiha compound.

"The meeting?" I asked as I narrowed my eyes.

"Yes, Father and every other clan member had been having them almost every night at the Naka Shrine before… that day. Father said they were important and they never came back until really late. That's why I was always practicing outside until late at night."

 _Meetings at the shrine? Why were they having them so often?_ I was confused again as if there was anytime this whole thing was clear. I wasn't present in the clan for three years before the massacre, and when I returned the day before the massacre, I was surprised at the abnormal tension in the clan.

"Itachi said something, he said the clan was hindering his ability to reach the height of his capacity. He said 'I've lost all hope for this pathetic clan'." Sasuke finished the sentence coldly. I didn't push him to say more, because what he told me was already shocking enough to process.

 _Again, Itachi also seemed to predict the future of the Uchiha clan just like Shisui did. I am sure now, that something had happened to the clan, or something was happening in the clan. Those meetings, they were for something important, a crisis that could affect the entire clan? Or maybe a decision that could change the fate of the clan. Whatever it was, it made Itachi and Shisui snap right before the crisis or whatever the clan was discussing happened._

That thought didn't comfort me because all it did was add to my long list of mysteries to solve. _The clan, it always had to be the clan._ I wondered if I hadn't reject Father's plans for me that night after the Chunin exam, if I hadn't been exiled from the clan, would I know what the hell had been happening in the clan? Probably, if I followed the path Father had planned for me, it would have landed me in the centre of the clan power and politics.

 _So would I be able to change the outcome if I knew the trigger? Maybe, maybe not, but since I don't even know what the trigger was, I never had the chance._ Before this day, I had pushed off countless regrets and guilt about making my brother take my place in Anbu, about letting him being confined into a dark fate for me. But never before, I had felt so much regret, so much guilt for being exiled out of the clan.

 _If only I could return to that evening; if only I had a second chance. I would accept whatever Father had planned for me, only for the sake of staying with Itachi and Shisui and going through whatever they had to go through. If only I wasn't a coward who ran away, I might not be able to stop what happened to the clan, but at the very least, I would know the truth._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

Sasuke jumped up in the air and gave me a roundhouse kick. Immediately, I bent my body and dodged back. Before he could retract his leg, I grabbed it and flipped him to the ground. Once he recovered from the impact, he got away with a replacement technique and I let him go.

Before Sasuke appeared, a little ball of orange came into my vision. Naruto attacked from the back, but instead of aiming for my head, he ran up to me and lowered his body at the last moment and aimed for my liver. I smiled as I sidestepped and avoided the punch. Finally, he was not just running up to the enemy and aiming at the most predictable places.

Naruto's attack wasn't finished, with a sharp turn, his attacking direction changed and he slammed his elbow towards my neck. Immediately, I blocked the attack with the arm guard. His strength was much better now, perhaps his endless streams of energy helped in physical exercises. He tried a few more attack at some of the critical points I taught him before scurrying away, realizing that I was blocking them all easily.

A wave of shurikens immediately followed, no doubt, Sasuke was on the move again. I dodged the shurikens as they flew by me and landed on the ground. Suddenly, my eyes narrowed at the ninja wires attached to the shurikens. _Of course, he is an Uchiha, and Uchihas love this trick._

A dozen medium sized fireballs followed the wires and were ready to burn me to crisp. Right away, I fired dozens of water bullets from my palms. Two or three water bullets crashed into one fireball at once, and it was enough to diminish the burning flames.

When the smoke cleared, Sasuke instantly appeared by my side, with his red Sharingans spinning in his eyes. He threw a punch at my ribs, this time, faster and more precise than before. I turned my body and let his arm sail straight past me. Straightaway, he stopped himself from moving with the momentum and ducked down, attempting to sweep my feet off the ground.

I jumped up slightly to avoid his legs, but he rotated his body on the ground and kicked his other leg up directly towards me. I was curious as to what he would do next, so all I did was block with my arm guards, and boy does he kick hard. With one kick, I was sent straight up towards the sky.

Sasuke disappeared from my vision and soon I felt a presence above me. I turned just in time to see Sasuke rotating his body for a powerful kick in the air, the kind that could send someone down to the ground and make a crater.

Just as his leg reached me, I move my body slightly so that his attack would slip past me by an inch. His eyes widened as I kneed him in the spine and we fell from midair. As his momentarily froze from the impact, I grabbed his shoulder and sent him to the ground instead. When we landed, I was on my feet and he was on his chest.

Out of nowhere, a bunch of ninja wires sprung up from the ground, intending to strap me. Clearly, I saw the sharp shurikens and kunais attached to the wires. Naruto, that sneaky little ball of orange, set up this trap beforehand. Unfortunately, the trap was at most a high genin level, and with a small replacement technique, I displaced myself with a rock nearby and silently hid in the trees.

"Awesome! Did we get her?" Naruto yelled with joy as he ran up towards the jungle of wires. Sasuke grunted as he made his way up from the ground. With one look at the messy wires and shurikens, he frowned.

"No, you dobe, there's no way Mai-nee-chan would fall for that. Keep your eyes open, she must be around here somewhere." Sasuke said as he tensed his body and moved closer to Naruto, the tomoes in his sharingans spinning furiously, completely alert and cautious.

I smiled at the duo as I body flickered behind them. "You are correct," I whispered as I place my hands on both of their shoulders and sent a small jolt of electricity into their body. The two nine-year-olds stumbled and fell to the ground. Naruto was lamenting loudly, while my adorable little brother stared at me with annoyance in his eyes,

"Don't give me that look, you started the whole ninjutsu deal," I said to my little brother and he turned his slightly red face away to avoid my gaze.

"That was so cool, Nee-chan, you need to teach me that." Naruto flailed his arms around to shake off the paralysis from his body. Soon, I had a little orange furball jumping around my legs.

"Good job, Naruto, now you are finally able to remember the critical spots I told you about, the key now is to practice. Once you are able to land a good hit that can stun the enemy, locking onto them wouldn't be a problem." I warned. I had offered to teach Naruto my style of taijutsu and he had accepted since he told me he wasn't doing so great in the academy taijutsu lessons. Amazingly, he had picked up the style fast, probably because he had no permanent style beforehand unlike Sasuke who was so used to the Uchiha style. Although I had my doubts about whether or not my style was the best fit for him, since he was so bright and straightforward, and breaking people's bones from the shadow seemed too much for him.

"You got it, Nee-chan, I will practice hard on Sasuke, he won't be able to escape from my locks ever! Dattebayo!" Naruto said excitedly as he gave Sasuke a challenging glare. Quickly, I placed my hand on my face to get ready for the storm of bickering coming next.

"Yeah right, Dobe, I'd like to see you try." "Hey, I wasn't the one who had his face kissing the ground." "Shut up, Mai-nee-chan was going easy on you." "Definitely not, you just don't want to believe I can beat you!" "Cause you can't dobe!" "Can do! Dattebayo!" …

"Stop!" Finally, I yelled at the duo with pure frustration. "Naruto, how's your chakra control exercise?" He suddenly became silent.

"I thought so. There are trees around here, a river that's a few hundred meters away and leaves lying around, why don't you start on something." I suggested. Immediately, Naruto's excitement disappeared.

"But it's so hard, Nee-chan, I really tried."

"I know, your chakra reserves are huge, so much larger than normal shinobi, that's why it's hard for you to control your chakra. But you know what, that means you have so much potential, you just need to be able to control your chakra at least to some degree before I can teach you any other ninjutsu. Otherwise, you will just blow up the forest." I explained to Naruto patiently. It wasn't hard to get the information that Naruto was the jinchuriki of Kyuubi. The secret only pertained to Sasuke's generation and Shun's hints definitely helped to put things together.

Despite the fact of it being an S-rank secret, the people around here were so prejudiced that it was hard not to know it. He was just a boy to me; a boy with the potential of being a nuclear weapon. Life was unfair to him, just as life was unfair to Sasuke, but he was not the one to blame.

Naruto nodded reluctantly as he went off to do the tree walking exercise. Finally, I turned my attention to Sasuke - my little competitive brother who was still sitting on the ground.

"How's your ankle?" I asked, watching with amusement as Sasuke's face turned red again, pouting and refusing to answer.

"Come on, there's no need to hide, I've been there once. Collecting the sensory information from the Sharingan and acting on it are two different things, that's why there was a lag time between seeing something and acting it out. When you tried to compensate for the lag time, your body overloads, and it's easy to hurt yourself." I spoke to him calmly as I kneeled in front of him, checking his bruised ankle.

"But you mastered your Sharingan when you were five! Father told me you are a genius, a once in a century miracle who activated your sharingan at birth, and I am learning Sharingan so slowly! At this rate, I will never be as good as you or Itachi." I listened quietly to his rant. He didn't understand, I cheated even before I was born, and Itachi, he was forced by the elders and his own father to activate his sharingan. I couldn't say that to him, or he would get more enraged.

"Not true, I believe you have the most potential of all of us, you should believe in yourself." I comforted him as I bandaged his ankle with dressings. His injury should be fine, it's just a small twist. However, being the troubled child he was, he didn't answer me. After a few moments of silence, I finally asked: "Anything else wrong? Might as well spill it all out."

"The Academy wouldn't let me graduate early, they said the policy changed." He muttered slowly.

"Really? Is that all this is about?" I asked, but before he could object, I continued, "It's not necessarily a bad thing you know. If you are promoted into genin, you would have to take missions like sorting crops and catching cats. If you improve your skill before that, your future sensei might be nice enough to make you skip those missions." Obviously, heartwarming encouragement wouldn't work for my brother, so yes, I was baiting him with practical logic. Trust me, he spent quite some time when he was little listening to my horrifying tales of boring D-rank missions.

"Anyways, start your Sharingan slowly, after a while, you will get used to the speed of Sharingan and your body will adjust to it. More so, your taijutsu was really well done today, could use a bit more speed, but again, that is just my suggestion. You get to choose how to improve your style. We will start on some Sharingan genjutsu next time, okay?" I ruffled his hair and Sasuke grunted in annoyance, but eventually, he nodded. Honestly, I had no idea when will be the 'next time'. My mission schedule was weird and packed, and there were the emergency missions that come out of nowhere. Today was a day where I was supposed to be free, and so far, I was still free, but you never knew when the next mission is coming.

"Am I interrupting some sibling bonding time?" I tilted my head slightly to face my orange haired roommate, who still looked as casual as ever. Before I could answer, Sasuke instantly yelled "Yes!" I gave Shun a small chuckle and said, "You heard him."

"Well sorry, kid, but I need to borrow your sister, her Shishou is the one asking," Shun said as he rolled his eyes.

"Akira-shishou? Why?" I asked. Shun gave me a shrug and he answered "He said it was to fulfill our duties as his students, so get up and let's go. He is expecting us in ten minutes."

"And why are you only telling me this now?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Figured you couldn't make excuses about a mission if I clearly catch you off-duty right before the thing."

"Cunning, sounds just like you," I commented and he just smiled back at me innocently. "Sorry, Sasuke, but Shishou's calling. Go to the hospital to check out your ankle, I mean it." I hugged my grumpy brother one last time before taking off with Shun.

"Now can you tell me what exactly we are doing?" I asked him again, but Shun just shook his head mysteriously "You will know soon." Eventually, I followed him to training ground seventeen. When we arrived, I immediately saw Akira-shishou's familiar figure, along with three others.

"Finally, the VIPs today. I thought Maiko isn't coming, seeing how busy you are." Our sensei greeted us with a smile.

"I thought the same until Shun roped me into this ten minutes ago." I said and gave Shun a glare which he ignored, then I asked: "Anyways, what are we doing here?"

"Shun, Maiko, meet my new genin team. You three, introduce yourselves to my last genin team, your senpais." Akira-shishou pointed towards the three small figures standing behind him and I trailed my eyes on those three newly promoted genins.

"Hi, I am Kanzaki Satoru, uh, nice to meet you, senpai?" The first boy with dark brown hair and freckles said uncertainly.

"Nice to meet you, Shun-senpai! Maiko-senpai! My name is Takemoto Momo! Please, take care of me!" The polite little kunoichi with a purple ponytail gave us a deep bow. I was mildly surprised by the respectful attitude she showed me, usually I was always the one calling others senpai, due to my young age. The feeling of having a kouhai was… refreshing.

"Ryuu. Just Ryuu." I turned my attention to the snappy voice of the third genin, then I was shocked. The boy had unruly black hair, with a pair of harsh cold eyes. From his widened eyes and shocked expression, I knew he recognized me as well. He was that boy in Kusagakure.

"Don't mind Ryuu, he a bit socially withdrawn, but he's a good kid." Akira-sensei patted the boy's back. I heard Shun whisper behind me "Sounds like someone I know", but I ignored him and fixated my eyes on the boy. If he was here, then that means he escaped Nishikawa's villa, came to Konoha, enrolled in the Academy and graduated within a year and a half. Now, it could be done, I supposed. The last time I checked, his chakra coil was much more developed than the other kidnapped children and I wouldn't be surprised if he had shinobi heritage in his family. But nevertheless, his appearance spoke of suspicion and trouble.

However, as long as he could keep his mouth shut and eyes closed, we shouldn't have a problem keeping distances from each other and leave each other alone. I was not _that_ interested in his life story that I would destroy the two sides of my carefully balanced life.

"Anyways, I thought the two of you can give my young students some advice, and they can ask you some questions about shinobi life…" Both Shun and I stared at Akira-sensei looking unimpressed. "Hey, I spent three years with you and I wrote you a recommendation letter." Akira-sensei pointed at Shun, "And you, I taught you for six years." He pointed at me next, "This is the attitude I get?"

"Calm down Sensei, we will do it." Shun finally said before Akira-sensei could get anymore enraged. "Good. I'll see you guys tomorrow, take care of them." Just like that, Akira-sensei forgot all the unhappiness and disappeared.

"He just made us babysit, didn't he." I sighed as I looked towards the direction where he disappeared to. Beside me, Shun just shook his head and then he turned his attention to the genins.

"So introduction time, I am Yamanaka Shun, a former student of Akira-sensei," Shun said with a perfectly polite smile on his face. A few months ago, he was promoted to tokubetsu jonin with his specialty in sensing and information gathering. We had yakiniku to celebrate his promotion, and for his promotion gift, he made me agree to pay for his share of the rent for that month… Shun was better at this kind of things than me, so I was fully prepared to let him deal with the genins. Unfortunately, he didn't think so.

"And the socially awkward girl next to me is Uchiha Maiko, a former student, and apprentice of Akira-sensei, until she got transferred to Kami knows where." I kicked him for that one, trying to wipe that sneaky grin off of his face.

"So, senpai, can you give us some advice on Akira-sensei, like what he's like and what we should do?" Satoru was the first to speak up. The young genin seemed eager and excited and I couldn't blame him. The feeling of craving more adventures must be more or less universal in this world.

"Don't piss him off, he likes teamwork, hates people that are late." Shun summarized as I sat on a rock behind him with no intention of joining in. Shun continued to talk about never trying to bribe Sensei or complain about D-rank missions, and I just listened passively. Those were the good memories, the nicer ones before one of us died.

"Umm, Maiko-senpai, if you don't mind me asking, do you have any trouble working as a kunoichi? I mean, I heard female shinobis are quite rare, and I am just wondering…" The girl, Momo, suddenly asked me. Her voice seemed to fall as she spoke as if she thought I would be angry or something.

"Yes and no, there will always be those who try to undermine us for being young or being a female. But we have the natural advantage of looking more harmless and thus enemies tend to let their guard down around us. Besides, gender doesn't really matter in battle, you are either strong enough to survive, or you don't." I said plainly, not sugarcoating anything. It was not my personality to do so anyway.

"Say, Maiko-senpai, you seem really young, like a lot younger than Shun-senpai, you almost look like our age. Are you two really genin teammates?" Oh yes, I was expecting this question, for the millionth time, everyone felt the need to question my age (except for my Anbu teammates, they don't care). I could hear Momo trying to quietly yell at Satoru with rage for being rude, and Shun was whispering in my ears "Don't kill him, whatever you do, don't kill him."

"Yes, we are teammates, we both graduated around eight years ago. The Academy system was a bit different back then, and early graduates were allowed as long as we passed the final exam. Following up with Momo's question, this is exactly the kind of question you can ignore in the workplace." I said as I gave the genins a chilling smile. Satoru took a step back as he felt my increasingly dark aura and Momo's face reddened with embarrassment. Ryuu, however, calmly stood his ground, as expected of a survivor who fought off my killing intent.

"So… moving on, any other questions?" Shun clapped his hands in an attempt to ease the tension and both Momo and Satoru relaxed their breath at Shun's nonchalant voice. I wasn't kidding when I said that Shun was better at this kind of stuff than me. It seemed to me that the only children I have a tolerance of these days were Sasuke and Naruto, and even then, they constantly gave me headaches.

"Just one more. Where is your other teammate? Genin cells are composed of three genins and one jonin, right? But there are only two of you here." Ryuu questioned in a detached tone. Immediately, Shun and I snapped our attentions to him. There was a sharp inhale coming from his teammates, and Momo shouted at him "Ryuu! Akira-sensei warned us not to ask that! It's so rude!" However, the person who instigated all this just stood there defiantly, as if mocking "What are you going to do?"

There were a thousand ways we could have answered that question, 'he is busy', 'he is out on a mission', 'he simply doesn't like meeting people'... Thousands of lies we could have told without even batting an eyelash. However, without hesitation, both Shun and I answered calmly and clearly "He died."

There was an awkward silence before I continued, "He was killed in action when we were still in a genin team." The three genins stared at us stunned, Satoru seemed to be in shock; Momo brought her hands up to cover her mouth, she seemed devastated; even Ryuu, who was cold as a stone, widened his eyes at the revelation. _What exactly did they think the answer was going to be? That he peacefully retired at the age of seventeen?_

"Look, shinobi life isn't all roses and glories, it's full of bloodshed and danger. If you can't accept that, it's best to walk out. Think about it, it doesn't have to be now, but you need to come to a conclusion before your first C-rank mission." Shun warned the young genins. Slowly and mechanically, the three children before us nodded. More likely than not, they would continue down this path despite the warnings. If the shinobis all left due to mere fear, then there wouldn't be a village left to run. It was only when something actually happened, then, these genins' mental strength would really be tested.

Suddenly, I felt a searing flare on my right shoulder. I was summoned through my Anbu tattoo. "Hey, Shun, I'm needed for a mission, so have fun with your info-sessions," I whispered to Shun as I picked myself up from the rock. First, he glared at me as if saying "Don't you dare leave me in this mess", then eventually he just waved his hands and shooed me off.

"Tell Sasuke for me that I'm off on a mission!" I yelled back as I ran towards the underground Anbu facility. I didn't need to wait for a response since I trust Shun would do it anyways. This mission came right on time, I was just getting suffocated by the awkward and depressing atmosphere. Uchiha Maiko had too much history and abnormalities; Rabbit, on the other hand, had no history and personal concerns.

'Sometimes, I just need a break from life,' was what I had thought before I went on this mission. If only I knew then what it actually consisted of, I would have taken my chances with bickering children and awkward conversations.

* * *

A/N: My story is inching closer and closer to the start of canon (in a snail-like speed). Oh dear, I think I'm making Maiko's life too trouble-free right now, so someone very unpleasant will crash the party soon. Muahahaha (evil laughter...)

Next update on Saturday as usual!


	21. Chapter 21 - Nostalgia

A/N: Here is another chapter! Hope you enjoy.

Beta'd by Alice J

* * *

Chapter 21 - Nostalgia

For the hundredth time, I stood in front of the Sandaime Hokage, cladded in full Anbu gear and wearing my porcelain rabbit mask. All of my teammates were here as well and they stood beside me, listening attentively to the Hokage's assignment.

"As some of you may know, the most recent Chunin exam which commenced three days ago was held at Sunagakure. Because we have a non-violence treaty with Suna, Konoha sent four teams of genins to participate. Word have been delivered that two teams advanced to the third round: the tournament and the Kazekage have extended his invitation for the viewing." Hokage-sama continued in a mellow voice, "I have accepted the viewing invitation, and as per the condition we agreed to, each Kage is allowed to bring twelve guards for the journey, in which three can accompany their respective Kages in the viewing booth. I have chosen six shinobi from my bodyguard teams, and I decided to assign Team Ro for the remaining six spots."

Sunagakure, the hidden village in the Wind Country. This brought back memories, I had my own Chunin exam and Chunin promotion in the exact same place five years ago. It was when my genin team still consisted of my close friend and my beloved Itachi-nii; it was a time when my biggest problem was only how to defeat the puppets.

"The tournaments commence in three days, the schedule Yondaime Kazekage has given us states that Hokage-sama along with other Kages should arrive the night before. Once the tournaments end and the decision regarding the chunin promotion has been reached, the Kages will be escorted out of the village immediately and proceed to travel back to their own lands." Jonin Commander Nara informed us as he handed a file folder to Hound, our captain. He informed us "Hokage-sama's travelling group will depart in one hour, please lead your full team back to the office prepared when the time comes, and your journey to Suna starts today."

"Understood." There was a chorus of reply before we exited Hokage's office. After some high-speed travelling, we were back to locker room 15. I sat down on one of the benches alongside Otter, and the rest of my teammates propped themselves against the lockers as Hound read the file in silence. The one eye he did not cover up scanned the words on the files at a lightning speed.

"We will travel with Hokage-sama until we cross the Wind Country's border, then three of us will split off from the main team and go to Sunagakure first. It seems that Hokage-sama wants the early-arrival team to confirm the reservation as well as to scout ahead for any abnormal occurrences and potential threats." Captain gave us an overview of the mission. Everything seemed pretty standard, the invitation, the schedule, the reservation.

The only problem was, why would the Hokage take Anbu as his personal guards to a foreign country? Anbu's presence to a foreign country usually meant hostility, which was why if we were sent out to complete a mission in one of the major foreign countries, we either masked ourselves or we moved so subtly that we wouldn't get caught. _Has the tension between Suna and Konoha become more strained than before that we need unauthorized protection?_ I wondered.

"We are not going to be Anbu, we will be the 'official' members of the Hokage guarding squad for the duration of his mission," Hound announced in his emotionless voice, yet I could swear I heard a sarcastic glint in his voice. Despite all his years in Anbu as a shadow, the moment he removed his hound mask, he would be recalled as Kakashi of the Sharingan, the dangerous shinobi who had been made a legend during the Third Shinobi War.

"So gather up your normal uniforms and stock up your supplies. Zebra, stock up on extra medical supplies, and everyone else, bring all the weapons you need. The chance of potential attacks will be low, but not impossible. Keep your alertness to the max, this is one mission we cannot mess up no matter what, are we clear?" As Hound commanded as the rest of us swung into motion.

The next ten minutes consisted of a lot of locker scavenging and tools flying. Soldier pills, jackets, sword holsters… everything Anbu specific needed to go and be replaced by Konoha issued outfits. Despite the fact that there were a lot of dangerous and sharp equipment flying in the air (including a few explosive signal flares), they sailed past each other and landed in the receivers' hands in perfect rhythm.

We returned to the Hokage's office half an hour early, so for the rest of the thirty minutes, we waited outside the office door silently. Right now, we had all changed our Anbu gear into the normal Konoha military flak jacket; from an outsider's point of view, we looked just like any other normal shinobi squad. Although, being only around 150 centimeters, my short height might have made the picture a bit abnormal.

"Welcome to Hokage Guard Platoon, well, at least temporarily." My eyes trailed over to the voice and landed on a man around his twenties. He had the hitai-ate wrapped around his spiky brown hair, and there was a distinct weal-like scar across the bridge of his nose and extended down his left cheek.

"Ah, Kakashi, it's been a long time, ready to jump the wagon so soon, or are you still looking for a retirement plan?" Another man whose head was wrapped in a hitai-ate bandana said casually while chewing on a senbon.

"Long time no sees, Raidou, Genma, looks like we will be going on a mission together." Kakashi waved at the two men casually as they stopped by the office door. By the looks of it, they must be the regular members of Hokage Guard Platoon; the ones who didn't have to hide their identities to get past Suna's border.

"Looks like it. So, Yugao-chan, have you and Hayate finally started the fling yet, or are you two still at the awkward stage of affection," the second man, whom Kakashi addressed as Genma, nodded his head at Otter, who looked like she wasn't sure if she should smack him or die of embarrassment.

"They've been going out for over a year, Genma, your information is too slow." Raidou commented from the side and Genma faked a surprised look and shouted "What? Hayate never told me anything, that little faker, when did he get the girl?"

"Can we not talk about my love life so blatantly in front of everyone?" Otter said annoyingly and glared at the duo.

"But we all know your love life, it's not like it's a secret or anything." Falcon teased with a visible grin on his unmasked face. I was pretty sure the only reason he was brave enough to make fun of the woman was because he was standing three people away from her.

"Hey, at least I have a love life, unlike certain people who can't keep their mouth shut, and you wonder why they don't have love lives." Otter retorted and a long chain of bickering ensued. I stood uncomfortably as the awkward conversation ensued. I had the strongest urge to rub my temple, but then it would probably be seen as rude. The last thing I needed right now was to stand out; I was perfectly fine being the small, short shadow in the group.

"If you want to do something to stop the headache, it's fine, because this will last for a while." I heard Zebra whisper from the side. True to his words, when I turned my head, I saw him placing his fingers to his temple, lightly rubbing the pressure points while shutting his eyes tightly.

Kakashi was reading his novel again, and Bear was standing by his side stoically as ever while the remaining bickered. They all knew each other, I realized. Of course, that was only natural, they were around the same age after all. Then there was me, standing awkwardly in the midst; the one who had no idea who anyone really was except for their codenames.

"Ahh, Genma-kun, Raidou-kun, I would appreciate if you could stop talking about love lives, not that it isn't a wonderful thing, but it feels really out of place for an old man like me. Besides, I believe we have a Chūnin exam to observe." The benevolent voice sounded as the office door opened, revealing Hokage-sama with four other bodyguards trailing behind him.

There was an awkward silence before the two bodyguards scratched their heads in embarrassment. All of my teammates bowed towards the Hokage, and that included Otter who looked like she wanted to crawl in a hole and stay there because of this mortifying situation.

"If we are ready, then we may begin our journey. Personally, I would like to arrive at Suna a night before the tournament, so I don't have to view the youngsters fighting and listen to Tsuchikage complaining while feeling sleep deprived." Just like that, the tension in the hallway was broken. _And that's why he is the Hokage. Powerful, genuine and amiable. The council may have some power in the decision making, but he is the image that everyone looks up to._

We were out of the village soon enough. We were travelling in a formation where Hokage-sama would be protected by all of us in the middle. The three elite guards of the Hokage surrounded the Hokage in a triangle formation, while the remaining three members of the Hokage Guard Platoon formed another bigger triangle outside the first one.

As for Team Ro, we kept a hexagon formation with a larger perimeter, about fifty meters away from the Hokage. We were the first line of defense if anything were to happen, although I doubt anyone would be stupid enough to attack the Sandaime Hokage, who was renowned as the 'God of Shinobi'.

The journey into the Wind Country was quick; after only a day, we had already crossed the border. The weather in the barren desert was much cooler than what I had expected. The rough wind with the smell of scorching sand rustled past my skin, and I felt much sharper and awake from the tingling sensations it brought. If I were to compare the travelling in Konoha's forest regions to travelling in a close-knitted pack, then it would be more akin to the feeling of wandering as a lone wolf when traversing the Suna deserts. The vast and barren sand dunes made the perception of distance fuzzy. Two travellers could look like they were very close to each other, but in reality, they were far, far away.

"Bear, Rabbit, Falcon, you three are going to be in the early-arrival team." Captain assigned quickly the moment we crossed into the desert, "You three are expected to arrive about two hours earlier than the main squad. On your way there, scout for danger and abnormal events. When you arrived at Sunagakure, check the Hokage's reservation and secure the accommodation." Which basically meant that we were to check for any traps or suspicious behaviours around Hokage's lodging. Sunagakure, despite having a treaty with Konoha, was a foreign military power, and like they said, "All's fair in love and war".

"Bear is the temporary leader of this squad, here is the identification from the Hokage," he pulled out a package in his jacket and handed it to Bear, "and I will send Pakkun with you. In a case of emergency, he will serve as the messenger." With that said, Kakashi quickly used the summoning technique and with a poof, the small pug appeared.

"What's up, Kakashi." The small pug greeted in his unique deep voice and Kakashi quickly explained to him the point of our mission.

"Ah, got it. Follow me, Kakashi's team, we don't have all day." Pakkun dashed out as he motioned us to follow. Soon, we were running on the scorching sand with full speed, leaving the main travelling group behind, until they faded into a black dot. Like I said, the perception of distance was fuzzy.

The road trip was unspectacular and full of long lasting silence. Bear was a quiet person, who rarely spoke more than what's necessary for the mission; of course, that rule didn't apply when he was with Hound, who apparently deemed teasing his poor kouhai a nice way to pass time when he wasn't reading one of his 18+ novels.

I was a quiet person by nature even if I were with people I knew personally, therefore, I didn't feel uncomfortable with Bear's silence. In fact, I was quite glad to be in the presence of such tranquility. Sometimes in the journey, Pakkun decided to climb onto my shoulder and hitch a ride instead of running in front of us. I didn't object, so I let him rest his soft paws on my shoulder without saying anything.

However, there was just one person in the group who didn't think that 'silence is gold'.

"So, nobody is going to say anything? I mean we have at least half a day's journey before we are even close to Sunagakure." Falcon asked from my right. Currently, we were travelling in a triangle formation, with Bear in the lead and the two of us following behind him like wings.

When none of us even spared a look at him, he sighed, "Come on, why are you two so quiet? The desert is already boring enough, travelling with the lot of you for another day is just painful." It was clear that no one would respond to his insults, even Pakkun, who was sludged against my shoulder like he was asleep, didn't make a sound.

"Seriously, I can understand Bear, he was like this ever since I joined the team, but what about you, Rabbit, you were so much fun that time when you were―"

"I dare you to finish that sentence," I said coldly as I glared at Falcon, who abruptly stopped his sentence and winced as if remembering all those dislocated shoulder and kneecaps. Still, I could see the hint of a smirk on his face. I shook my head, I tried, I really tried, but I guess the point of his provoking was getting me to speak.

"This is getting eerily quiet, too quiet," Falcon spoke up again when the silence settled once more. It was the middle of the night, the dark sky casting still shadows on the barren landscape, turning the golden sand of the day into dull, grey wastelands. However, unlike the forests in Konoha where the tall trees blocked the sky, the shine from the moon and the stars clearly projected itself onto the sand dunes below, giving the dull surface a smooth glow.

"The only reason why you would find this quiet is because you are always too loud." Bear's composed voice sounded once before the silence befell us again. Under the background murmurs such as "I can't believe I got him to speak" from Falcon, I suddenly remembered a scene from long ago.

 _They would bicker like this as well, Shun and Daichi, the time we were sorting crops, the time we were cleaning the roof, and the time we went on the C-ranked mission…_

Suddenly, I felt Pakkun's soft nose rubbing into my neck. "What's wrong?" I whispered. "I thought I smelled some sadness on you," Pakkun answered casually, but when he saw my confused expression, he elaborated.

"Human bodies have all kinds of smells and chemicals released when their emotions are stirred, and it's particularly strong in hormonal adolescents. I thought I smelled some sadness on you just now, so what's wrong, little pup?" I listened quietly as Pakkun explained. _Was I feeling sad? I don't know, I thought I had contained the trauma to a manageable level, but then again, it was only contained, not forgotten._

"Nothing really, I just remembered something from long ago," I said in a small voice. _Can I mourn for him? That memory seemed so far away like it was a different person, and I was just an observer. It was like they are packaged into boxes that were labelled 'DO NOT TOUCH'._

They were too much, I felt like if I opened even one, all of them would flood out, like that emotional breakdown in the hospital, like the first time I had died. _No, those boxes belong to Uchiha Maiko, and I am Rabbit right now. Uchiha Maiko has a purpose, she wants to find out the truth behind the massacre, a conclusion as she calls it; Rabbit will keep all her emotional baggage away so that she can find it._

"Pray, do tell, we have the whole desert to ourselves for the next twelve hours, probably, and you won't really get another chance for an emotional dump." I snapped my attention at Falcon's casual words. _Doesn't he know that he is asking for some dark, dark secret? We are teammates, sure, but we are not that close._

"Unfortunately, he's right, pup. The best way to get over something is to dump it out, and those who are trained in secret keeping are the best listeners." Pakkun confirmed on my shoulder. I sighed, there was really no end to my mental evaluation, was there?

"Fine, if you really want to know, I just remembered my genin teammates, we had that conversation a lot when we were doing missions. One of them just wouldn't shut up, no matter how quiet the environment was." I said calmly, revealing no emotions. I was Rabbit now, and those emotions were not my concerns.

Suddenly, there was dead silence around me, none of them responded, no encouraging words, no subtle counseling sessions, even Falcon, who always had something to say. I eyed them one by one, and their heads were lowered slightly and none of them looked me in the eye.

"Seeing your expressions, I guess you two were on the team seven years ago with Captain, and both of you saw him dying." It wasn't really a guess, I knew so, and I knew that they remembered exactly who I was talking about. Bear and Falcon's heads dipped lower, and from Falcon's unmasked face, I could see a faint trace of pain that he was trying to hide.

"Don't get me wrong, I am not trying to invoke guilt from both of you. Captain and I already had that conversation, and I am long past the phase of needing to blaming someone to feel better. My point is, I, don't know you, not your history, hell, not even your real names. But all of you know me, you know my history, my losses, my griefs. Don't you think it's unfair, asking me to reveal everything when you don't do the same." I stated as I watched my teammates' bodies stiffen, but I wasn't finished.

"All of you keep secrets from me, treating me like a fragile doll, always tiptoeing around me like I am going to break if you even so much as mention the word "Massacre" or "Itachi". It's unfair to evaluate my present based on my past. I am not Uchiha Maiko for as long as I am in Anbu; I am Rabbit, a member of Team Ro, an Anbu agent. I am not saying that you should tell me everything, you have your secrets and I have mine, all I'm saying is that you try to treat me the same as you would with any other recruit. If Hokage-sama or Captain orders you to shut up about something around me, then that's fine. But don't speak in codes around me just because you think I can't handle it." I finished all my rant in one breath, Kami knew why I decided to straighten out this problem here, on an ongoing mission, when the private time would have worked a lot better. But I already started it, and the unofficial-subtle-psych-counseling was getting really unnecessary and annoying.

The desert was silent again, I could feel the tension building and straining as I finished my little impromptu speech. _Oh dear, this is awkward, I should have thought more before starting a rant about personal rights in the middle of a mission while running in a foreign desert._

"I see." I heard two quiet words slip from Bear's mouth that temporarily broke the silence, "We had no idea this is how you have been feeling, and we will consider our actions more from now on. We have let your special status cloud our judgments and please trust me when I say that we had no intention of treating you unjustly. However, I think you should know that only me and Falcon were on that mission with Captain, the fourth member was KIA soon afterward, and Zebra and Otter only joined later." Bear continued in his stoic and calm voice, but I could still hear the faint guilt and regret that he rarely showed.

"I meant no disrespect really, I wasn't trying to pry," I said quickly, suddenly realizing how inappropriate my actions were as affecting my teammates' mood during a mission was enough to get us killed. To my surprise, Falcon gave me a light chuckle before Bear spoke up again.

"Don't worry about it, I appreciate my temporary subordinate speaking up about her opinions, especially when it involves the team. Trust me, if starting an inappropriate conversation counts as an insubordination, then Falcon would have already earned five strikes on this mission alone." My eyes widened a bit as I heard Bear's speech, did he just… tell a joke?

"However, I would like to talk to Captain about this, just so that the rest of the team understands your feelings." Bear continued despite Falcon's protest, and he turned around just in time to see me nodding my head.

"I don't mind, it's just that I wanted to be treated as a normal member of the team. I appreciated all of your concerns, but please, no special treatment." I said with sincerity injected into my voice because it was kind of hard to not yell out 'stay out of my business' in a polite way. Thankfully, maybe they were too busy trying to comfort me so they accepted my answer readily.

Pakkun's furry body rubbed my neck affectionately, and Falcon gave me a bright smile, even Bear gave me an uncharacteristic tiny smile. For a second, I felt bad for using Anbu, for using my teammates to gain the answers that I so craved. But it quickly disappeared when I thought back to my life.

 _It is the logical answer,_ I kept on telling myself, trying to let go of the guilt that shouldn't be there. _I need to maintain a good relation with Konoha for the sake of my brother, which means I cannot desert the village to look for answers, nor can I act too obvious. So the best way of getting the answer would be to infiltrate the inside and collect information there. I was so close, just one more piece of information: what was the meeting of Uchiha Clan about? The reason why Shisui and Itachi snapped, the start of it all._

 _Just one more piece, and I could get my answer._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Konoha Chunin, Aohara Chiyoko." I raised my hand to catch the Sunagakure guard's attention and the guard examined me critically.

"Registration number?" He asked in a harsh tone, and I immediately gave him the string of fake numbers that matched the identification documents he had in his hands right now. The guard stared at me with distrust for a painfully long moment but I kept my body semi-relaxed, not too tense as if I was hiding something.

"Your team looks clear." He finally said, "Please, wait for a moment, someone will be here shortly to take you to the Hokage's designated resident." The guard's voice was anything but friendly, but nevertheless, Bear kept his face blank as we waited for whoever was supposed to come. All of us were given fake identities for the mission, so for the time being, I was Aohara Chiyoko, a fifteen-year-old Chunin and a newly recruited member of the Hokage's personal guard platoon.

"Sorry for keeping you waiting, Suna is honoured to have the Hokage attending our Chunin exam. Please follow me to Hokage-dono's temporary residence." Soon, a tall shinobi greeted us. He was wearing a Suna military jacket for jonin, half of his face hidden by a turban wrapped in the Sunagakure style, while the other half of his face had two red marks drawn on the cheek. He looked very serious and his words were professional and emotionless, his visible eye inspecting carefully, digging behind the surface of what he observed and then layers under it.

"My name is Baki, a jonin of Sunagakure. Hokage-dono will be staying in the Eastern Quarter of the Embassy, Please rest assured, safety measures will be provided extensively by our shinobis." The jonin, Baki, explained sternly, as he led us to the Embassy. From the information Captain gave us, only the Hokage, Raikage and Tsuchikage would be attending, seeing as Kirigakure was apparently in a state of chaos with their communication cut off, so each Kage would be occupying a separate section of the Embassy.

I eyed my surroundings meticulously; the lodging was well kept, with at least ten rooms in the building. The only entrance to the compound seemed to be the front gate, which was guarded by a platoon of Suna-nin. I had no doubt that Suna already set traps and surveillance around and inside the compound. If things took a wrong turn, the Suna-nin would have the advantages here. Despite the completely emotionless voice Baki used, I could hear the undertone, warning us not to do anything stupid, or the so-called 'safety measure' could quickly become our prison.

"Baki-san, Hokage-sama would be arriving in two hours, we would like to ask permission to look around the accommodation to make sure Hokage-sama's preferences are taken care of." Bear, whose cover name was Takano Heiji, asked with the same professional tone. Baki stared at us for a while, eyeing Bear with the stone statue face I was so familiar off.

"Of course, Takano-san. Please be careful of the security measures in the room, and please stay close to the Eastern quarter," Baki answered without a smile. "If you so choose to wander out of the area, then we cannot guarantee your safety." That was the silent warning; a hidden message so straightforward that it was like a burning sign in my profession.

"Of course, Baki-san, Konoha thanks Suna for your hospitality," Bear responded as if he did not understand the warning. Baki nodded once before he left with, leaving us in the foreign Embassy, with at least two dozen Suna Shinobi surrounding the building.

When we felt all the chakra signal in the vicinity left, Bear immediately started to communicate with us through the hand signs. ' _I will scout the area surrounding the building, you two search the area inside. If you find any trap, mark them, dispel them and set up one with your own variation. We will meet back here in one hour.'_ With small nods, all of us dispersed and started our duty.

I disabled a hidden kunai trap near one of the bedroom doors, it wasn't very lethal, but nevertheless very annoying. This was my fifteenth? Sixteenth trap? The Suna-nin really put their hearts out to trap this area, but I doubt their motive was purely for Hokage-sama's safety. With a careful swing, I cut the connecting wires loose with my tantō and the dozen of kunais clattered to the ground. Then I pulled out my own thread from my pouch and stringed the kunais using my own method. I only moved the location for a little bit, but the projecting pathway was completely changed now. I had yet to see any large trap other than kunai threaded with wires or chakra sensing arrays, and they are easily dispelled if one knew what they were looking for.

I checked the area as thoroughly as possible, but trapping was not my specialty, which was probably why Kakashi was always able to get through my traps at my apartment. Either way, Bear would most likely ask Falcon to re-check the area once more, since trapping and scouting were his specialties after all.

"All done?" Falcon asked me when I returned to the meeting point, he and Bear were already there waiting.

"Yes, I dispelled and re-made all the traps I could find, but Falcon may want to look over it again," I responded and Bear nodded at my suggestion while Falcon groaned at the sign of extra work.

"Good, you are off for the next hour, go out and relax for a while, umm...go appreciate the foreign scenery." I raised my eyebrow as I heard Bear awkwardly trying to make it sound casual, but it didn't work; the Bear I knew doesn't ever talk about relaxing. But as soon as I got over the awkward phrasing, I understood the hidden meaning of his words: _Scout the village, as subtly as possible._

"Why am I the one who get's the, umm, vacation?" I asked curiously. Falcon was a sensor and Bear's jutsu made him ideal for infiltrations, so why me? I could move subtly for assassination, but it wouldn't work with a village of shinobi. We couldn't risk being discovered snooping around.

"Aww, you are thinking about this the wrong way. Nobody said you have to be completely out of sight. We are here for the Chunin exam, and the average age for genin participants is 14. Tell me, how old do you look, Chiyoko-chan?" Falcon suddenly said behind me with his playful voice. I glared at him for taking a jab at my fake identity and he promptly ignored it like usual.

"Take Pakkun with you and return after 45 minutes, we will then receive the main squad at the village gate," Bear ordered and immediately Pakkun jumped onto my shoulder from nowhere.

"Yes, sir, I understand." There was nothing else I could say really, so I just silently started to disguise myself as a genin participant.

The streets of Sunagakure seemed unchanged compared to my brief memory from the visit years ago. The night market was still rowdy and lively for the Chunin exam, children playing with small puppets, tourists wandering around the stalls, there were even some foreign genins walking around the market with curious eyes.

I was wearing a dark blue jacket instead of the green Konoha military jacket I came here with. My twin swords were strapped on my waist using the sword holster, and I tucked my Konoha hitai-ate away in my pouch. I walked slowly in a relaxed manner with Pakkun in my arms, but my eyes were scanning the surroundings subtly, taking in every detail. I was quite aware of the fact that Pakkun was sniffing in concentration for any hostile air around here.

There were some Suna shinobi patrolling in the area, which was a natural occurrence; with loads of foreign shinobi in the village, anyone would get nervous. I kept my body light and looked around in a curious manner. I didn't try to hide the fact that I was a shinobi, but Falcon was right, with the Chunin exam, most Suna-nin would just assume I was a participant because of my young appearance and leave me be.

Suddenly, I stopped in front of a store because there was something familiar about this. Nostalgia, that was the feeling, maybe it was because of the interesting weapon design hanging on the wall that made the feeling especially strong. It was the same store I encountered during my Chunin Exam, I could still see the wooden crossbow design hanging on the shop wall, exactly like the one I bought for Sasuke for his fourth birthday gift (although I had no idea where it went, Sasuke probably broke it while playing).

A small crowd of teenage girls was gathering in front of the shop, they were chatting happily while staring at something in the shop. It was interesting, had weapon shops always been this popular with Suna girls, especially since they didn't even look like they were kunoichi?

"Would you like to look at something, little customer?" I instantly snapped my attention at the foreign sound, and when I looked up, I saw a waterfall of dark blue hair, cascading down the front of the yukata. There was a young man smiling at me as he propped himself on the shop front. Nostalgia. Familiarity. That was what my instinct was screaming as I inspected the stranger in front of me.

"No, I was just curious, that's all, forgive me for interrupting," I said quickly as I shook my head. It was all very clear now, from the heated gaze the girls were giving me at this moment, I was pretty sure that they were not interested in the weapon, but the man selling them. He was probably in his late teens, almost twenty maybe. I supposed that there was some effeminate beauty involved. However, I quickly equated him with 'danger' in my mind. Anyone, anything that could turn people's brain into mush, both literally and figuratively, was deemed as dangerous in my book. Those type of things required careful handling.

"Ah, don't worry, what kind of shop owner would I be if I don't even try to bring in more potential customers." I raised my eyebrows slightly at his words. The last time I came to the store, which was five years ago, a middle-aged man was running the shop. Just for the sake of the disguise, I scanned my eyes around in the shop. Designs of bows, crossbows hang on the wall, there were also a few machinery toys, such as birds and animals that were made to run or fly with a switch. Suddenly, my eyes widened when I saw one of the merchandises lying on a chair at the corner of the shop, half hidden behind the leftover wooden panels. Despite my best effort at controlling my expression, I failed. It was a gun, a wooden one, not with black metal and plastic, but nevertheless, it was the shape of a handgun, with the angled outline and the curved trigger.

I looked up towards the man, and I was thankful that his attention seemed to be drawn by the chattering girls. Quickly, I composed myself as the teenagers giggled and pointed. The shop owner smiled as he took off a merchandise - a small wooden mechanical bird - from the wall and wrapped it for the girls. "Come back next time." The man said with a gentle voice, and that only caused the group of teenage girls to giggle more as they left.

I had to resist the urge to roll my eyes because that was exactly how people got themselves killed. At least I had the decency to hide my inner disdain, while Pakkun just snorted loudly in my arms, drawing the attention of the young man.

"Now, how may I help you." He asked, completely unfazed by Pakkun's display.

"The last time I came here, which was very long ago, there was someone else running the shop, if I remember correctly," I said. Pakkun seemed to be quite interested in the conversation with his ears perked up, and the man seemed to furrow his eyebrows as if thinking in concentration.

"You must have met my father. Yes, this was his shop a few years ago, but sadly, he passed away a year ago. And from that point on, I took over the shop." The man answered with just the right amount of sadness in his voice.

"Oh, I am really sorry to hear that."

"Don't worry about it, my father would have been glad that an old customer returned." It was a plausible thought, the last shop owner did mention that he had a son, who apparently introduced the design from somewhere.

"So, did you invent these peculiar weapon designs?" I asked lightheartedly, trying to make casual conversations. Even if my question was directed towards all the merchandises, I pointed my finger at the hidden wooden object at the back of the shop.

"Yes and no. I wouldn't say that I invented them when the mechanism has been around for longer than I have lived. I simply recreated the forgotten design, trying to use some novelty to bring in sales." He answered calmly, then under my gaze, he picked up the gun and said: "Although I would hardly call them weapons, I believe the official labels I put on these are toys and tools." As if in demonstration, he raised the 'toy' behind him and pulled the trigger. There wasn't a bang from the powered gun, or rather, the gun really looked like a toy, with the spring as the main mechanism instead of the actual device one would find in a semi-auto pistol. The wooden pellet inside of the barrel bounced harmlessly off of the wall and rolled off onto the ground. It truly seemed harmless, at least, in appearance anyway.

"They don't seem very safe either," I muttered.

"But they are not dangerous enough to hurt shinobi, and that's the standard of this world, isn't it? Normal people's weapon wouldn't able to compete with their use of chakra, these are just toys in their eyes, aren't they?" The man asked me the rhetorical question as he put the wooden gun down, but I had no idea how to answer that.

Surely, he knew I was a shinobi since normal civilians just don't walk around on the street with swords and a ninken. The way he phrased the sentence, it was so ambiguous, and it seemed to extend to more than just a mere discussion of what defines as a weapon. This world, as I knew it, did revolve around shinobis. I rarely interacted with civilians - despite the fact that their population outnumbered shinobi twenty to one - and I probably saw the shinobi way of life as the social norm as well.

It wasn't about who was the superior race, it was simply because the shinobi have stronger power, and that's why civilians pay us and we protect them. That was the reason I chose to advance in shinobi skills, so I could be strong enough to survive. Most civilians seemed okay with the idea of being protected by shinobi, they seemed accepting of the fact that their abilities wouldn't match that of shinobi's.

The little sarcasm I just heard in his still voice, that was something unusual. It almost felt like he was mocking the civilian's inability to do anything in a world of shinobis.

Before I could say anything, I heard a loud explosion and the ground seemed to shake. When I looked up again, one of the buildings near the Kazekage's office was on fire. Immediately, my hand went for my swords, and Pakkun jumped down from my arms, ready in the battle stance.

My eyes widened with disbelief as I saw the swirl of light brown sand and golden sand mixed together. It looked like they were dancing, but the huge amount of menacing killing intent leaking out of that area destroyed any part of the artistic aesthetics one might find. The golden sand... I narrowed my eyes, there was only one person alive that could manipulate that: the current Yondaime Kazekage.

This wasn't a fight where I could do anything, or should do anything. The Kazekage was handling whatever threat they had, although the aura from the battle reminded me of that of a beast. My job was to regroup with my team and guarantee Hokage-sama's safety before anything else.

The civilians were already ducking inside and closing the doors and the lively market was soon empty and isolated. All that's left on the street were a few foreign genins panicking, unsure of what to do. Surprisingly, the young shop owner besides me didn't close the store front and shut me out like all the other shops did. He looked at the destructive scene high up in the air, with an emotion that I couldn't quite name. Awe? Disgust? Fear? No, none of them were completely right.

"Oi! Genins, return to your quarter immediately and don't come out until your next exam! Anyone disobeying the order will be disqualified!" A Suna-nin passed by and yelled at the remaining confused children on the street. There were a few quick nods and they scrammed. For a genin, there was truly nothing scarier than being disqualified from the Chunin Exam.

Suddenly, just as I started to move towards the Kage's hotel, I heard a voice yelling at me, "The genins are all going that way, aren't you going to return to your lodging with them?" I turned around and saw the trademark smile of innocence plastered on the man's face. _Right, here is one more potential source of trouble that I don't really have time to deal with._

"Now, who said I am a genin?" I whispered and stared into his eyes. As soon as the man's eyes widened, they became dazed and confused. It wasn't a dangerous genjutsu, I applied just enough disruption on his poorly developed chakra system to hinder his brain activity. He will be feeling dazed and confused about this encounter and after a while, he will just pass them off as a dream; eventually, this memory would cease to exist.

Without any more delays, I ran towards the Embassy. My instincts told me that that man, or his seemingly outlandish concept, was troublesome. The confounding sense of nostalgia wouldn't turn my brain to mush, but it sure as hell confused me. That, was dangerous, and I already had enough dangerous things in my life. For example, the raging sandstorm that was currently tearing apart the Kazekage's office, and it was getting dangerously close to the Embassy.

See, this was the main problem of having way too much absurd shit in my life. Because they hit so close together, it was hard to keep track of all the problems and the less immediate ones often got forgotten.

 _The first day as Aohara Chiyoko and I have already gathered more problems than I have the time to solve. But whose list is it really on this time? Uchiha Maiko's? Rabbit's? Or someone else's? Anyway, got to keep them organize; categorize by priorities, and just pray that they will wait until they are called before surfacing gleefully like the most impatient children._

* * *

A/N: That really unpleasant person who will crash the party will appear next chapter, and it's from canon, so cookies for anyone who can guess it.


	22. Chapter 22 - Serpentine

A/N: Okay, so as much as I would like to say that updating early is a habit, it's not... So I am occupied for this Saturday, so I might as well just update this half a day early.

Beta'd by the joyful Alice J.

* * *

Chapter 22 - Serpentine

"Nothing unusual for the first thirty minutes, then a major disturbance broke out east of Kazekage's office. Kazekage seemed to be fighting the enemy using golden sand, whereas the unknown enemy or enemies is/are powerful enough to summon huge amounts of sand. From what I saw five minutes ago, the golden sand of Kazekage seemed to be winning." I reported in a monotone voice. In front of me, both Bear and Falcon had 'serious' written all over their faces. They were silent and tight-lipped; from their expression, they probably knew what the hell was going on, but they weren't telling me.

"Stay vigilant, Aohara, we will be staying inside until the situation clears. This is not a fight we should be anywhere near of." After a few moments of silence, Bear finally said.

"Team leader, if I may ask, what is going on?" I asked quietly. From the Suna shinobi running around, I sensed urgency, but I didn't sense the vast amount of panic that arose with the feeling of the unknown. The Suna-nins were either very calm, or they had been through the same situation before.

"What's the status around the building?" Bear suddenly inquired, and Falcon closed his eyes for a second, before responding, "All clear, most of the shinobi around the area are being dispatched away, the ones left are less than a dozen, all stationed at the front gate." There was another wave of silence before Bear finally spoke up.

"I guess your clearance is enough since you are in Anbu. There are some villages that practice sealing the power of a tailed-beast into children, so that the village may possess great power; those human sacrifices are called jinchūriki. Just like how Konoha has the Kyūbi, the nine-tail, Sunagakure has the Ichibi, the sand demon, the one-tail." Bear paused a bit and let the knowledge sink in.

Immediately, the image of a smiling Naruto popped up in my head. The jinchūriki of Konoha, who was the brightest kid I'd ever met, with his loud yells and unwavering determination to beat Sasuke. It was hard to equate him with the malicious aura from those sands. It was absolutely beastly, with killing intent spreading like a poisonous miasma.

"We had some reports that the Suna that the jinchūriki seemed to be unstable, but he was able to draw the tailed beast's power from a very young age, which makes him very dangerous. One of the greatest feats of the current Yondaime Kazekage is his multiple subjugations of the one-tail during his reign." My body tensed at Bear's description; a weapon as dangerous as a tailed-beast combined with emotional instability was just a sheer disaster.

Naruto was a perfectly bright kid, albeit a bit lonely and sad from all the discrimination he faced, but his sorta-working-but-not-really friendship was helping the problem. I couldn't help but take note of his pent up emotions from all the discrimination and isolation, and despite being a hypocrite myself on expressing emotions, I was concerned if he would be able to take the stress. If he couldn't, then I guess the Suna jinchūriki was a show of the result. Emotional instability coupled with great power equalled disaster, there was a reason why every Anbu agent had monthly or even weekly psych evaluations. At least in Konoha Anbu, you got a chance at recovery and counselling sessions and the worst punishment you could get was forced retirement (under the condition that you didn't kill the wrong people); at OLYMPUS, any sign of emotional stability or abnormal tendencies, and you disappear.

Suddenly, I had the urge to ask Naruto how had he done it? Staying so joyful and outgoing despite prejudice glare he had received from fearful people. It seemed so hard to keep your sanity when the world was against you. I was so very curious because I simply couldn't imagine the answer.

"I have dispatched Pakkun to warn Hokage-sama, and we are going to remain right here until the situation outside is over. However, be prepared to deal with any incoming danger." As if proving his point, just as Bear finished the order, there was a small quake. The building shook violently and Bear immediately used his wood release to create a dome over our bodies. Sand and dust smashed against the dome, creating menacing scratchy sounds against the thick wooden panels. The quake continued for a few minutes and eventually, the surroundings were quiet again.

"Holy shit, if this was just a small aftershock, then I don't ever want to see the whole thing." Falcon cursed at the rumble around us. With just that last surge of power, the Eastern quarter of the Embassy had gained a large new hole on its roof and half of the corridor was buried in wood splinters and heavy dust.

"On the bright side, the situation seems to be clear outside," I added, noticing that the feeling of menacing and malicious aura had disappeared.

"Yes, but we may need to contact the Suna diplomatic division, seeing as the residence for our Hokage, who will be arriving in around ten minutes, is completely not up to standards," Bear said with a straight face. Falcon groaned loudly, realising the fact that we then had to scout and mark another building.

Out of sheer misfortune, the Eastern quarter was the only place affected by the earlier battle. The jonin, Baki-san, returned and apologised profoundly with a "Don't talk about it" warning that we were totally going to ignore. Then he led us to the South-Western building, a smaller, but still presentable part of the Embassy.

"Okay, I'm going to make this quick, seeing as Hokage-sama should be arriving in five minutes. I will clear the courtyard and the surrounding area, Falcon will de-trap and re-trap the building, while Rabbit will go receive Hokage-sama." Without another word, we left for our posts. I had five minutes before I would be late receiving the Hokage, and I needed to run from the central of Sunagakure to one of the gates.

I was lucky that most of the guards were busy dealing with the aftermath of what happened earlier, so I arrived just in time to see Hokage-sama's team appearing over the sand dunes, gradually becoming bigger and bigger from a tiny little black dot.

"Hokage-sama." The moment they passed the village gate, I moved in front of the Sandaime and kneeled in respect.

"Chunin Aohara, it's nice that you are here. I assume that everything is in order?" the Hokage asked with a warm-hearted voice.

"There were some… disturbances with your temporary residence, but they should be all sorted out now." I answered in a professional tone, ignoring the awkward and rageful glares the Suna-nin leading the Hokage gave me. Pakkun should have briefed the Hokage about the jinchūriki incident, and any further detailed knowledge should be exchanged in private.

"Lovely, then shall we move on? I have travelled a long way, and I would really like to rest before the ordeal begins." I bowed again at Hokage-sama's lighthearted words and followed the team as the Suna-nin awkwardly tried to keep courteous smiles plastered on their faces while leading the Hokage to the South-Western Embassy.

By the time we arrived, Falcon had already managed to de-trap half of the area, which was an amazing feat considering that it has only been around twenty minutes from when he started. As Hokage sent some other members of his guarding platoon to scout and secure the area, Falcon, Bear, and I were summoned to his private room armed with numerous privacy seals and lethal traps.

"So, is there anything else I should know about other than the fact that there has been an unplanned jinchūriki battle in the middle of the Chunin Exam?" The Hokage asked with a smile, but I couldn't tell if he was saying that as a joke or not.

"According to Rabbit's observations, the fight lasted for about twenty minutes, and the Kazekage's gold dust was able to subdue it, but a small area East of the Kazekage's tower was destroyed," Bear answered. Hokage-sama looked at me for a moment before letting out a small sigh.

"Good work, the three of you. I imagined you are all very tired. The One-Tailed attack was probably not planned, but they also seem to be a normal occurrence in Sunagakure as well. Please go see your captain and let him assign you the guarding shifts. Then you may rest." At Hokage-sama's words of dismissal, we all bowed and exited the room.

I was assigned the same room as Otter since apparently we were the only females on this exposition. Together, we had our assigned shift in three hours. The moment I crashed onto the bed, of course after checking for all security and setting up my own traps, I closed my eyes in exhaustion. I hadn't slept for two days, and I had been on constant high-speed travelling from Konoha to Suna. Suddenly, I understood why Hokage-sama wanted to arrive in Suna early for a night at the lodging, at least I wasn't the one who had to deal with fellow Kages with clouds of political tensions in the air while relying on merely five measly hours of sleep.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

The tournament opened with loud cheers and continuous applause. Despite the incident yesterday, the enthusiasm from the audience was still over the clouds. This was the open tournament, the bi-annual event where new generations from the shinobi villages got to show off their prowess. For the participants, this was about recognition and promotions; for the spectators, this was about excitement and village pride; for the Kages and their villages, this was about the competition for clients, glory and status. In a way, this was a war in itself, just without as much bloodshed.

I stood at the back of the arena, watching the genin matches in a passive and critical manner. My attention wasn't really on the fights, but rather the changes in the surroundings, and with my Sharingans, details and movements were easy to record.

With a loud round of applause, the semi-final finally commenced. I looked down for a quick moment, seeing the most elite batch of children fighting their guts out not for the sake of survival, but rather for pride. That in itself was almost as lethal as a battle of life and death.

I didn't even need to look up to know who had arrived beside me when I felt the familiar rush of wind. I didn't greet him and he didn't greet me, we simply stared off at whatever we were supposed to be looking at in silence.

"Feeling a bit nostalgic? You fought in the same arena exactly five years ago" Kakashi whispered casually beside me. Yes, I remembered, as for nostalgia, that was a strong word.

"I'm glad that I forfeited in the semi-final." I suddenly voiced. Fighting, whether for survival or for pride, was something that exposed one's true nature and there was no way that I would willingly expose myself and my brother in front of all these people. I wasn't sure back then, but now, I was certain that if we had fought, there would have been more things exposed for the world to see than what I was comfortable with.

"It was the logical choice. I wouldn't have been able to beat him." I added, feeling the need to explain my strange comment. There was a brief silence between us that was drowned out by the cheering of the crowd.

"How would you know?" That was all he asked.

"We fought shortly after we got back to Konoha. He trashed me completely," I answered honestly, remembering his genjutsu. How had he been better at genjutsu than me when I had awakened the Sharingan earlier? The only logical reason would be that I slacked off in practice, and unlike me, he was a true genius and a hard worker.

"That's not very confident, or inspirational for what you want to do." The emotional colour in his voice was dim, but I could still hear a sense of confusion.

"No, it's not. Sasuke seems to get the idea that in order to kill someone, you have to surpass them completely. Unfortunately, it doesn't work like that. You don't have to surpass your opponent in everything to kill them, just certain areas, the correct ones." I paused a bit, then I continued, "Perhaps, it's because our conception of killing was different, and that caused our goals to deviate as time passed, or maybe it's never been the same to begin with."

A long silence ensued. It wasn't necessarily awkward or uncomfortable; it was much more calming and tranquil and gave us time to think and to compose ourselves.

"I used to think that I could surpass him in one particular area, but now, I am not really sure about that." I finally said, breaking the calming silence. I narrowed my eyes at the battle in the arena, the second battle of the semi-final was coming to an end, and one of the kunoichis had the other completely trapped, but the other one was not giving up.

"What area is that?" I paused a moment before answering, wondering if I could really say the answer out loud.

"A cold-blooded heart," I whispered for the last time and sealed our conversation shut as the semi-final ended and the final match began.

 _Itachi was a gentle child, one full of kindness and love. I used to think that it was so ironic of Kami to give him a genius aptitude for the life of a shinobi and yet, make his personality so full of kindness._

Maybe our conceptions of death, or pride, or even just the word 'shinobi', were different as well.

Perhaps, that was all there was to it.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

A Suna genin won the tournament. The Kazekage was happy, but the other Kages were not. Unfortunately, there was nothing they could do, so they chose the next best option other than declaring war: they discussed the promotion of the chunin candidates. At least one genin for each major village was promoted as chunin. By three o'clock in the afternoon, two more Konoha military jackets were handed out, and two more chunins were born.

Hospitality really was rare in a foreign village, as the moment the announcements ended, Hokage-sama's team departed from Suna. One 'My pleasure', two "thank you for your hospitality (presence)", three light nods, and we were out of the Wind Country.

According to the route we were taking, we had to cross the Land of Rivers, a small country stuck between the Wind and the Fire. Just like Kusagakure and Amegakure, the Land of Rivers never had much influence in the presence of the larger villages. We traversed the grounds of a foreign country, but we were not nearly as tense as we had been when we were in Suna.

 _This is a flaw,_ I thought. Danger could be everywhere, but it was human nature to relax when we thought the biggest threat has passed. However, I did want to get out of Sunagakure; to stay away from the nostalgia that stirred up emotions before anything bad could happen.

"Team Ro, Please gather around." I followed the voice of Sandaime with curiosity. The mission so far had been quiet, excluding the little incident in Suna, but nevertheless, this was probably one of the better missions I had been on. No one died, no one got killed, and we all had our limbs still attached. Now that we were only a few hours from the Fire Country's border, I hadn't expected Hokage-sama to pull out an emergency meeting.

"Due to the confirmation of some information, I have an emergency mission for you." The Hokage said to the six of us, "Our intelligence department has evidence to believe that around this area, in the Land of Rivers, a secret base of a Konoha missing-nin was hidden." My mind was racing through a million possibilities right now. _What are we going to be asked to do? Raid? Infiltration? Scout? Clean up?_ I was a bit concerned with the identity of the missing-nin, it wasn't every day that a missing-nin manages to build him/herself a base that made Hokage worry. _Ah, maybe this was why we were sent on this mission. The point was not the escort, but rather as a preparation for this._

"According to the report, the base appears to be abandoned. However, this was deemed to be a high A-class mission only due to one single fact: the owner of the base is...Orochimaru." The Hokage finished the sentence with a serious dread. My teammates around me rustled in shock and discomfort. It was no chatters, but for Anbu, this meant all hell breaking loose.

"Orochimaru is an extremely dangerous S-rank missing-nin. Formerly one of the Legendary Sannin, he used to be one of my students." There was no denying the sadness and regret in Sandaime's voice, and suddenly, his voice felt distant, contrasting his usual kind voice for lectures, or his stoic voice for authority. There was a certain unsaid regret lingering in the air, but then it was quickly dispelled and the Hokage continued, "He defected and was marked as missing-nin after his immoral actions of human experimentation had been exposed. After that point, he was actively pursued by our village."

"The mission objective is to mark the base, clean up any remaining problems and bring the information to our R&D department," Hokage-sama ordered in his stern voice. An unsaid agreement reached the six of us, 'clean up' meant destroying any dangerous objects and eliminating any dangerous people. From what I'd heard, Orochimaru was a dark secret of Konoha, what he did bring were the shame to the village and their reputation. I could understand the village trying to keep his trace as secret as possible, wiping away any trace of his condemning actions.

"Hokage-sama, please clarify the order if we are to find the missing-nin." Our captain voiced despite the tension. I was very aware of the fact that Hokage-sama paused in hesitation, despite the clear policy of Konoha for its missing-nins to be killed on sight, just like other villages.

"It would be very unlikely, but there is no denying the possibility. You are to follow standard procedure and eliminate the target to the best of your ability." He answered slowly, as if chewing on each word until there were nothing left, "However, I'd much rather see all of you alive, and thus, you are allowed to disengage and report back if you find yourselves outmatched. Your team is set for an A-rank clean-up mission, not an S-rank hunting mission." I blinked in surprise at the unusual command, There was never an instance where the Hokage-sama was instructing us to step away from eliminating a missing-nin. The understanding in Anbu was that we would finish our objective even if we were to throw away our lives, so the thought of Hokage-sama specifically instructing us to act differently was… unsettling.

"Understood, Hokage-sama," I muttered coherently along with my other teammates. I stood behind my captain, watching the main entourage moving away at the lightning speed, leaving us behind in an air full of discomfort and tension. My teammates were observably nervous, Falcon stayed silent, Zebra was clutching tightly onto his medical scrolls, and Kakashi moved his hitai-ate up to reveal his scarred eye with the Sharingan. Automatically, my hands went for the swords on my back, lifting them out of their sheaths slightly, checking to make sure that it would only take less than a second to flash out the metals.

"To cover the large area, we will split off into three groups. We find the entrances - there's apparently three entrances that are likely to lead to different quarters, considering how Orochimaru usually built his hideouts." Kakashi analysed the intel scroll with precision, and from the concentrated gaze in his eyes, amplified with his Sharingan, I realised that he had most likely been to one of the hideouts before, possibly on a previous mission. He narrowed his eyes in deep thought for a few seconds, before speaking again, "I will be teaming up with Zebra, Bear will be with Otter, and Falcon with Rabbit. Once you find the entrance, investigate the inside with care. Orochimaru likes to trap the area." The rest of us nodded,

"Do not, I repeat, DO NOT engage in a battle with anyone without signalling the rest of the team for back up. Considering the size of Orochimaru's underground base, we will likely be quite far from each other. So anyone you see, including your teammates, could be an enemy. Orochimaru is a master of disguise, and a missing-nin of S-rank, you will not be able to fight him alone. Take this seriously." I had never seen Kakashi this serious before. He eyed us tensely, scanning our faces and bodies to make sure we had all heard what he said; to make sure we all had a reasonable amount of fear injected into us. "Ever since Orochimaru's defection, to my knowledge, fifteen Anbu teams were sent to recover him. Only five members survived." We stayed silent at the horrible revelation. I didn't particularly want to die, especially not before I got my answer. I came too far, fourteen years too far, to be exact, to throw my life away again.

"Move out." Kakashi's voice cut through the air sharply and within the blink of an eye, the area where we stood a second ago was now empty. I followed Falcon as we searched through the rocky jungle terrain of the Land of Rivers. Captain already gave us a general location for one of the entrances, however, it was up to us to find the hidden doorways to the doom.

"Say, Rabbit, Captain told me your trapping skills are not that great. In fact, I think his words were 'any hooligan with any kind of alertness will be able to get through'." Falcon said as we searched the ground for any traces. Despite his seemingly serious tone, I knew that Captain did not say that, at least not those exact words, since Kakashi never used the word "hooligan". It was way too straightforward for him. So I ignored him and kept my Sharingans on the details of the dirt.

"I think it's probably due time for me to give you a lesson on traps, or more accurately, how to dispel traps. Count yourself lucky, we got a wide variety of samples to study from." I perked my head up in interest. I never turn down an opportunity to learn something that could potentially save my life. Though I could feel his voice being unusually tense despite the humour. Some people use humour to deal with nervousness.

"Tell me Rabbit, what kind of traps we tend to use the least in residence." I thought about Falcon's question and immediately answered, "Explosives."

"Correct. Explosives are dangerous, they are powerful, but they can hurt anyone. However, tell me one situation where they would be the most efficient trap." Falcon asked with a smile. After a second of thinking, I answered with realisation dawning on my face, "To destroy a deserted base along with all of its information." Falcon nodded at my answer and pointed behind him, slightly to the right. I followed his gesture, seeing a hidden underground cave, just enough for one person to slide in at a time. When I looked closer, I could see a thin black line across the cave entrance. If Falcon took one more step behind him, he would have crossed the line. Given the lecture he just gave me, I doubt it would have been a pretty scene.

"There are two main types of explosive traps. One, the chakra infused kind, where the whole trap is made of a large amount of concentrated chakra that when activated, they could cause huge damage, and they don't have any visible signs. However, the downside of it is that the chakra would be so concentrated that for a sensor or those who could see chakra, they are dead giveaways." Falcon smirked, and just like what he said, my sharingan detected no concentrated chakra, that was probably why I couldn't find the entrance as fast as he did. As a seasoned scout and tracker, Falcon's eyes were trained to pick up those types of marks.

"The second type, which is the kind behind me, is the chakra triggered type. This type utilises natural explosives such as explosive tags and dynamite, which can be easily activated by even a tiny hint of chakra. Once someone unfortunate triggers the trap, they go ka-boom with no idea why." Falcon bent down and ushered me forward. I looked over his head and watched him carefully work on the thin black line. His finger followed the line carefully until it reached some kind of web design hidden a few meters away.

"That black line you just saw is the trigger line, and usually it's connected to the chakra entry point. However, this particular design has a complicated design to confuse whoever wishes to de-trap this. Only one of these lines is the correct chakra entry line, while all the others are trigger lines. If you touch the wrong line, the chakra will be released, and I'm sure that the abundant amount of explosive tags buried around here would blow us all up to pieces." Falcon instructed with an awfully cheery voice despite the morbid content, and he patted me on my back and invited me forward, waiting for me to make a decision that could potentially blow us up.

With a sigh, I squatted down beside the trap and laid my eyes on it with concentration. It was complicated, thin black lines overlapping each other, but Falcon mentioned that trigger lines had to be connected to the chakra entry line. My eyes scanned frantically for the line of connection, black tomoes spinning furiously in order to solve the puzzle. Some of the lines were muddled together, they seemed to connect, but in reality, they missed each other by only a fraction of millimetres.

Slowly, I raised my hand and pointed towards one of the lines, but quickly, I retracted my fingers. "You can't be unsure when you are asked to dispel the explosives. Careful, yes, but confidence is key." Falcon whispered behind my head. I bit my lips for a moment and glared over the trap one more time.

"That one." I pointed at one of the thin black lines. Only this line was connected with all the other trigger lines, this was the only pathway that made sense. With a smile, Falcon cut the chakra entry line with a kunai quickly, and for one second, my heart raced at the possibility that we were going to blow up.

"Good job, with more practice, you should be able to identify it in half the time." I let out a breath and stood up, Falcon had already walked back to the cave as he let his words trail behind. He stood there for a few seconds in concentration before he spoke up again.

"Follow me closely, I can feel a few chakra infused traps inside. For those, it's usually easier to just leave them be." Just like that, he quickly descended into the cave. Immediately, I followed him into the unknown.

The cave led to a tunnel, which had a rusted metallic ladder built on the inside. Falcon was about one meter below me, but when he reached the bottom, he did not step onto the ground. Instead, he jumped up and swung onto the strangely placed bars on the ceiling. With one swing, he landed on the ground, about half a meter away from the bottom of the ladder. I could only guess that there was a trap placed at the bottom of the ladder. I copied his movements and landed right beside him. Without a single word, we moved deeper into the hideout.

We dispelled a few traps on our way, mostly weapon traps and a few explosives. The frequency of explosives was so high that it would be very impractical for a hideout, and most of them were unavoidable ones that require a lot of careful work to dispel. I guess the hideout really was abandoned, and the traps were added for the sake of blowing any discovery into pieces.

As we entered deeper and deeper, the light was snuffed out. My Sharingan was fine on its own in the dark, but Falcon had to pull out a flashlight to light the path. I stepped carefully onto where Falcon had stepped on previously. He had taken the time to explain all the different types of traps we encountered, but because we were kind of short on time here, he took care of all the easy traps, and for those that would take too long to dispel, he simply marked it on a map and walked away.

Finally, after an excruciatingly long walk in the tunnels, I finally saw an arching door leading to a dark room. Carefully, I took a step to where Falcon had walked before. It only took a fraction of a second for my instinct to scream 'DANGER'. I felt a light click where my foot touched. Without a second thought, I body flickered a few meters back. The moment I was out of the range, a shower of kunais rained down onto where I used to stand. I stared at the kunai filled the floor, if I had been a fraction of a second late, it would have been me impaled with kunais, and I had no idea what triggered it.

"Double trigger. This is tricky. I didn't know they used that method anymore. It was supposed to be triggered on the second step so that the first time one passes through it will appear to be normal. Lesson number whatever in de-trapping, always stay calm when you trigger something. The first one might not kill you, but the second one you triggered in panic will definitely kill you." Falcon said calmly as I carefully made my way to him. His voice was so dispassionate that I guess I should be honoured that he placed so much faith in me for not dying.

"Shall we, let's see what Konoha's most notorious criminal has hidden in his nest." His voice hinted a cold laughter. We both knew it was no invitation, we might as well have been walking straight into a venomous nest; even if the snake was out, it didn't make the venom in the lair less dangerous.

When I stepped into the huge room, it was a sight I couldn't unsee. It was a scene filled with carcases. Literally, body organs filled the shelves, lining the floor, some of them scorched and some of them in pieces, some of them were still in their broken containers, the usually clear liquid that was used to preserve organs for medical purposes was muddled with substances I didn't want to know. There was absolutely not a speck of blood, but that only made it so much more disgusting and horrifying. Involuntarily, I closed my eyes to stop the Sharingan from receiving any more of this image.

Falcon was also speechless beside me, and for a second, he seemed unsure of what to do with this. The strong smell of disinfectant and preserving chemicals filled the room, mixed with a light smell of something sickly rotten. Despite the display in front of us, all the organs were well kept using preservation methods. The sickly smell must have only started in the past few days, which meant that the hideout must have been abandoned recently.

"We should start the de-trapping." I managed to say, my voice was so small and raspy it sounded like I hadn't used it for a while. Our job was to assess for threats and remove them to the best of our abilities. As for the content of the hideout, those are for the Research and Development Department to handle.

Carefully, I stepped towards the wall, it was always best to start at somewhere, and the wall and the ceilings were usually where most traps were placed in a room. I stepped around a pool of … something, it was charred to pieces. I couldn't identify it, and I didn't want to either.

It was clear this was a research facility since it was filled with strange and familiar scientific and surgical instruments. There were pipettes, beakers, and tubes, some resting on the metals tables, some broken on the ground. There was also some equipment I had never seen before, not that I was very good with research equipment in the first place, but their design was so unique they were most likely to be something specific to the world with chakra.

Falcon was quick to work as soon as he was out of the shock. By the time I finished a wall, he was already done with two. "This is so inhumane." My head snapped towards Falcon's whisper of words. He stood in front of a broken water tank, staring at it with wide and horrifying eyes.

I followed his gaze, the first thing I saw was the murky water filling up to the large crack in the tank, then I saw the human figure hanging limply in the glass tank. Instinctively I brought my hands to my mouth to cover it, forbidden it from making a sound, pushing the sickening feeling down back to my stomach.

Human experimentation, the very act of taking away one's freedom, rights and identity. I was afraid to look any further, even if I thought I was prepared for anything, I wasn't. Orochimaru was something I had not prepared for, just like the human puppeteer, his action was even more repulsive. Just like the night of the massacre, I thought I was prepared for the worst, but it wasn't until I saw the racks of bodies with blood that I realised, I was so very wrong.

"Let's finish this quickly. I don't want to stay any longer. This place is sickening down to the soul." Falcon finished with anger in his voice. I nodded my head and went back to work, chanting the calming phrases in my mind to keep the sickening image out of my head.

We covered the room and any adjacent facility we could find, in total, we covered an area at least a few hundred meters squared. We couldn't find any other exits besides our entry point, Captain's suspicion was mostly correct, the three entrances seemed to be leading to separate facilities, maybe there was hidden passage in between, but we were not planning to stay to find out.

Quietly, we exited the hideout, still processing everything we'd found today. Falcon threw a few scrolls he found in the hideout into a sealing scroll, but other than that, we didn't touch anything. When we saw the lush jungle and the blue sky again, we both greedily took a large breath, trying to shake off the smell of disinfectant.

It was supposed to be a simple and straightforward mission, we enter, we get rid of the traps, we search the area and we meet up with our teams again. It was very unlikely that any point in the timeline could have resulted in unexpected events.

However, as Lady Luck willed it, it was never that easy.

Suddenly, Falcon's body tensed, his eyes closed in concentration. I was very familiar with that stance, Shun used it every time when we were trying to focus on sensing. Before I could ask, he spoke up.

"There is someone here, hiding, invisible, fifty meters north of us," Falcon said coldly, one of his hands rested the Anbu sword while the other pulled out a kunai. Immediately, my eyes darted towards the direction he mentioned, and I pulled out my twin swords. I didn't even need to know if that's one of our teammates, the simple answer would be no; there was no way our teammate would be alone at the moment, let alone hiding from us.

"Well, well, would you look at that. Looks like my gamble has paid off. Sharingan, and just the pair I was looking for." A devious voice was the first to come before a man seemed to melt out of the ground, emerging from the soil like it was water.

My breath hitched, it stuck in my chest just from the sheer pressure of the atmosphere. Despite the man's wry smile, the killing intent he spread was so concentrated that if I wasn't so used to the bloodshed, I would have been paralysed in fear.

However, the real fear and shock stemmed from recognition. There was no way I could not have recognised that ash white face with purple marks around his eyes, nor that large purple rope tied around his greyish-yellow garb. This was an image straight out of the Konoha Bingo book. The one man who had taken the spot as the most infamous traitor of Konoha for more than a decade.

"Children shouldn't poke around the venomous serpent's den, you never know when the serpent will return. What does serpent do when he find preys in his lair?" Orochimaru murmured with a chilling smile, his eyes landing right on me, and I resisted the cold that permeated my body, leaving the barest hint of shivering.

"He plays with them until they are dead."

* * *

A/N: [counts with fingers] Ah, three years before the Chunin exam, it's about time for Orochimaru to show up. Oh, now that I think about it, the next update would probably be on Friday as well, since next Saturday is the Christmas eve (maybe I should just change the update schedule to Friday, we'll see). Look at that, the Christmas update will be directed by Orochimaru! (Now, whether that was a good thing or not, it totally depends on the perspective ;)


	23. Chapter 23 - Madness

B/N: Yo! Alice here! Zoe is sick with studying (which I should also be doing, but never mind ^_^) so I'm here to introduce you to our new director (who I don't really approve of, but you know, Zoe's never really listened to me properly) who's pretty...let's say, eccentric. Anyhow, let us welcome the wonderful and interesting Orochimaru-sama!

* * *

Chapter 23 - Madness

"He plays with them until they are dead." My attention snapped at the word "dead". I didn't want to die, not even if it was one of the S-rank sannin who wanted my head. Immediately, I remembered Captain's instruction, we should regroup; with Kakashi's skill and Bear's wood release, we might actually stand a chance against Orochimaru, or at least it would give us enough time to disengage and run away.

It was all so quiet, like a prelude to the ruin, the calm before the storm. Against the heavy killing intent in the air, which was a mix between mine and his, Falcon slowly, in an almost non-existent speed, moved his hand closer to the pouch, to where the signal flare was.

His eyes were on Orochimaru, who in turn completely ignored him and kept his eyes on me. He stared fearlessly into my crimson sharingans as if my genjutsu ability was a mere mockery. Despite my supposed advantage with my eyes, I couldn't help but feel an urge to turn my eyes away. It was a survival instinct, like a rabbit in the face of a wolf, but still, I kept them open and focused, unwilling to show any weakness.

"Fufufu, sharingans, look at those beautiful eyes. Uchiha Maiko, the second prodigy of the Uchiha clan. A rare entity even within the dojutsu clans. Of course, not that the Uchiha clan exists anymore, the talented Itachi-kun made sure of that." I tightened my grip on the swords, and before I could even control it, sparks of lightning sizzled on the blades.

"Rabbit, keep your emotions in check," Falcon warned beside me. Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale. Slowly, I calmed my flaming chakra. I was getting sloppy, maybe it was because of the tense atmosphere that heightened my emotions, or the particularly annoying missing-nin standing before me. I couldn't help the anger and rage that rose within me when he mentioned Itachi and the Uchiha massacre.

 _What did he know? Everyone looks at that tragedy with the same pitiful expression, as if they know everything, how the pain erupted when the deaths unfolded. But it's not that simple, it's so complicated that I felt so hopeless when I was in front of the cliff called 'mystery'._

"I've heard a lot about you, from your brother. Itachi-kun is amazing, and I wondered how well you would fair against me." I knew there was psychological warfare embedded in his sneaky voice, taunting me, provoking me. Yet, I couldn't stop myself, this was the first piece of information I had about Itachi ever since the massacre.

"Where did you meet my brother, tell me," I muttered, in a small voice, trying to keep it calm, trying to keep my voice from faltering. _I need to keep him talking, the longer I stall, the greater our chance of survival will be. Good thing that we have a common topic of interest to talk about._

"So demanding. First of all, you have to prove yourself worthy. Itachi-kun faced me before, and now it's your turn." That was the last thing I heard before he disappeared into the ground again. Falcon released the signal flare without a second thought, just as a sea of brown slithering snakes surrounded us. They came out of nowhere like they had just manifested into existence. I didn't even need the presence of Orochimaru to tell me that they were deadly.

Immediately, I gathered a deadly amount of concentrated lightning chakra along the blades of my swords. I swore my brain calmed down a bit after hearing the familiar sound of birds chirping. "Chidori Electrifying Web!" I yelled as I slammed the swords into the ground. The streams of icy blue lightning travelled outwards into the surrounding. After I infused the principle of Chidori into the electrifying web, the speed was doubled, and the damage also tripled. However, it was always a pain to control them, making sure so that no Chidori would hit Falcon. The icy lights spread out in the blink of an eye, engulfing every snake in a fifty-metre radius like a deadly spider web.

The tingling sensation of electricity in the air and the smell of something charred stimulated my senses. I was acutely aware of my surroundings that behind the smoke, another wave of snakes circled us. Orochimaru was driven out of the ground by the ninjutsu but he was standing just a little over fifty meters away, smiling and watching with a sick mockery of curiosity all over his face.

"We _need_ to get away. There's no end to those snakes," Falcon yelled beside me as we stood back to back being. The only thing we could do was to keep shooting out ninjutsus, in the hopes of reducing their numbers, if even a little bit. The actual snakes were not much as a threat when in comparison of the vast numbers. Taijutsu would be very ineffective against the large numbers, so we resorted to shooting out ninjutsu in order to buy some time to figure out a way to get out of this mess while still keeping ourselves alive.

I blew a stream of fire towards the enemies, spreading it in a wide circle, incinerating the slithering flesh. I had no idea if this was my imagination or not, but those snakes seemed to regenerate from the ashes, forming from the speckles of black and grey in the air.

"I'm trying, they are blocking the paths. If we are slowed for even one second when we move, they will overwhelm us." I squeezed out the words in between my breaths. Suddenly I felt something piercing through the air, aiming straight for my head. With the help of my sharingans, I was able to push my swords in front of me just in time.

There was a loud, harsh clink of metal against metal, my twin swords crisscrossed in front of my neck, holding back the tip of a glistening blade stretching all the way across fifty meters. Orochimaru was holding the hilt casually, still smiling, still studying.

There was a slithering sound in front of me, and I looked down just in time to see his abnormally long sword swirling into a snake. The white snake gave me a hiss before sliding effortlessly around my swords. Eyes wide in shock, I was trying to decide if this was a genjutsu or not. However, my sharingans didn't pick up anything, and with the sharp fangs baring down on my neck, I was not going to take a chance.

I replaced myself with one of the logs in the area. The moment I landed, I made the hand seal for Fūton: Windmill Scythe. A circle of pale white wind blades formed around me, and when I finished the last hand seal, they spun furiously around me and pushed outwards, shredding the snakes into pieces. When I was able to breathe again, I had a three-metre radius clearing around me, the hordes of snakes slithering and hissing at me, but they weren't making any advancements.

"Amazing! It is true that your talents rival your brother. Able to do five nature releases, plenty of A-rank jutsus in your arsenal. You activated your mangekyou sharingan even earlier than Itachi-kun, though I've yet to see that. Don't worry, I will have plenty of time to explore once you have become my new vessel." Orochimaru uttered quietly, but just loud enough for me to hear. I didn't know if Falcon heard it or not. If he did, he gave no sign for it. I almost laughed in exasperation, if I weren't surrounded by deadly snakes. So much greed, so much ambition, they were all aiming for my eyes, my kekkei genkai. I guess I really shouldn't be surprised, considering there were only three (and a half?) pairs left. _Vessel?_ My mind raced to figure out what he meant. It sounded just like a puppet, threaded marionettes, trapped within my own body, unable to control anything.

I hated puppets.

"Now that I think about it, you are probably a better match for me than Itachi-kun. As delicious as his body would be, yours should be much better." He licked his lips slowly, voice filled with a greedy playfulness.

At that moment, I really wanted to kill him. Not out of a sense of duty, not out of survival, but rather out of the pure wrath I was feeling right now. I understood fully how emotions could destroy a person or did I? I never actually tried. But I guess I would find out soon, because, in hindsight, everything I did after that point was stupid.

"What did you do to Itachi!" I yelled at him, sounding more frantic than I had ever been before. I felt a surge of chakra directed into my eyes, then I blinked. When I opened my eyes again, it was mangekyou sharingan.

Orochimaru must have felt my glare, because the moment I focused my right eye on him, a Rashōmon Gate stood in front of him. Black flames seared the gate, yet there was no smell of anything burning, nor were there sparks, but the fearsome demon gate crumbled and disappeared in Amaterasu.

When I put out the black flames, Orochimaru had disappeared. Immediately, I realised he must have blended with the ground. Without a second thought, I recklessly infused concentrated lightning chakra into my ninjatō and stabbed the ground.

"Always keep your eyes on the enemy, Uchiha-kun, always assume that they are at least one if not several steps ahead of you." My head whipped around just in time to see the disgusting image of his head extending off of his shoulder, connected by a long, elastic 'neck'. There was a glint of amusement in his slitted golden eyes as he opened his mouth, showing off his protruding fangs that were an inch above my neck.

I didn't hesitate when I activated my Kannon Bosatsu in my left eye. Suddenly, the world in front of me stopped, and Orochimaru's fangs hovered over my neck. His eyes were frozen at the transition, a look that ranged between amusement and shock.

Immediately, I felt the rapid drain of my chakra and the increasing pain in my left eye to hold the sannin in place. Even if I only placed the jutsu around him, the chakra in his body system was so enormous that it threatened to break free of the time prison I created. I pushed away the dizziness and swiftly slashed my tantō in a small circle. The moment my sword connected with his neck just as the time prison broken off. But it was too late, my sword had already sliced opened his neck and I could clearly feel the smooth flesh being sliced open. My blade passed through his neck and the head - its mouth still open with fangs sticking out - flopped down to the ground.

For a few seconds, all I did was watch the head roll in a slow motion. Everything was so quiet, the snakes stopped hissing and Falcon, who was clearly standing a few meters behind me, was so silent that I couldn't even hear his breathing. I felt a sense of relief in my chest, _he couldn't be still alive, could he? There is no way…_

The serenity only lasted for a moment as I watched in horror. Orochimaru's head turned and gave me a creepy smile before the broken neck sprouted dozens of snakes and connected with the snakes sprouting from his fallen body.

I was very aware of the fact that I should get away, but I just stood there, watching the terrifying regeneration ability taking place. _Orochimaru, he is not human._

There it was again, his golden eyes glinted with mockery. Without a care for my chakra level, I focused my right eye on him again just as his head flew back to his body. I widened my eyes and let the black flame sprout from his chest. His smile disappeared for a second before he body flickered away at such a high speed even my eyes couldn't follow.

When he appeared again in the middle of a horde of snakes fifteen meters away, his right arm was burning into dust. I suddenly felt a desperate pride when he narrowed his eyes and slashed off his arm without hesitation. The ball of flame fell to the ground and started to incinerate the mass of snakes by his foot.

I almost gasped when I felt the sharp pain in my right eye, it was reminding me that I was approaching my limit. Reluctantly, I closed my eyes, feeling the thick metallic liquid running down my cheek.

"Interesting. A time-space ninjutsu that can stop the flow of time, and an invincible flame." Orochimaru mumbled calmly, despite him missing a limb from the shoulder joint. "It's almost very befitting, your brother took my left arm a while ago, and just now you took my right. But it doesn't matter, once I have your body, I will be reborn anew with a perfect body."

 _Does he even know how creepy and disgusting he sounds?_ I didn't have time to contemplate that since the snakes started to attack again. I had no idea how Falcon was faring, but I imagine he was busy enough dealing with the snakes. Just because Orochimaru wasn't focused on him, didn't mean his ninjutsu was any less to deal with. I still had no idea how he kept the snakes coming in waves, but I suppose it had something to do with his inhumane regeneration abilities.

"Where is Itachi? Where is he!" I growled at him as I slashed apart dozens of snakes using my swords. My body turned and twirled, putting all the kenjutsu skills I had ever learned into use.

"Compare to your brother, you should worry more about yourself. Just imagine his face when I have taken your body, what will he look like? Shocked? Horrified?" He laughed. Yes, he had the audacity to laugh.

"Shut up! He doesn't care about me anymore!" I yelled out, dodging a metallic blade shooting out from one of the snake's mouth, before cutting it in half myself.

"But you, you care for him." I almost stumbled as Orochimaru let the words hang around me, a dozen snakes managing to sneak up past my defence. Simultaneously, blades projected out of their mouths. I could hear Falcon yelling my name, telling me to move. At the last moment, I jumped up just in time to avoid being skewered by a dozen swords.

"So you do care for him. How intriguing. Would this be considered fraternising with the enemy? Itachi-kun is a traitor and a murderer after all." The damn snake sneered, taunting my mental sanity. I would have never imagined the name of one person being able to turn my brain into mush, but alas, _his_ name did, and Orochimaru knew it.

I was not thinking straight, I doubt I had ever thought straight from the moment I met Orochimaru. I was so reckless, so bold without any care for consequences. _Because I am so angry, I didn't even know I had the capacity for this much rage and they are urging me to kill him, just kill him and tear his worthless body to pieces._

 _Yes, my brother, Uchiha Itachi, is branded as a traitor, and he is a murderer of his own kin. But you were not there, and you don't have the answer. So. You. Don't. Get. To. JUDGE._

I locked my eyes on him, and despite the feeling of exhaustion and the stinging pain, I captured him with my left eye. It was only a brief moment, but Orochimaru stopped. I landed on the dozens of blades coming out of the snakes' mouths and propelled myself forward. I heard the familiar chirping sound again as I pointed my ninjatō at his heart.

Just as Kannon Bosatsu broke the Chidori blade made a beautiful icy blue beam and thrust itself into my target's chest cavity. The Chidori blade extended the ninjatō's range by a meter. Despite my eyesight being coated with blood red, I could clearly see his chest being pierced through and through. I learned the human anatomy by heart, and for any normal human, the hole in the position I just pierced would kill them instantly.

But Orochimaru wasn't a normal human, if he could reconnect his neck, he could definitely rearrange the position of his heart, or did he even have a heart? I didn't forget that crucial information. No, I was just too mad and too desperate to try anything.

Orochimaru grinned at me, there he went again, taunting me, mocking me. I hated that so much. A thick brown snake shot out of his left sleeve and I retracted my blade and fell back hazily. However, I was not fast enough, and as I withdrew, the snake sneaked up on me and wrapped itself around my left leg. I almost immediately turned my blade and sliced it open, but not before it bit me on the ankle.

It wasn't so much as the searing pain, but rather the feeling of heaviness in my leg that made me panic. _Paralysis poison_ , I cursed as I fell disgracefully by Falcon's side, who was just vigilant enough not to impale me on an earth spike.

"What the hell are you thinking? Charging in like an idiot!" Falcon hissed at me in a low tone of disapproval, however, I could hear more worry in his voice than anger. Awkwardly, I struggled to stand up, leaning on my non-paralyzed leg for support. The poison was already spreading quickly through my lower leg and I was having a hard time resisting dropping to my knees.

"Resilient and fast, I love it. How about you join me, I will even be generous enough to help you achieve your revenge." The damned snake said with a humourless smile, and I just regarded him coldly. _Does he really think I'm that stupid? So weak for such obvious manipulation?_

"I'll reward you one fact, for almost killing me twice. Itachi-kun is currently affiliated with an international mercenary criminal organisation called Akatsuki, and every member they have is an S-rank missing-nin. Now do you still think you can kill him without my help?" I swore my heartbeat stopped for a second, and my left eye wasn't the one doing it. _Is that real? Is that true? Most likely yes, why would I think otherwise. There aren't a lot of jobs available for missing-nin are there?_ I thought, with a bitter taste in my mouth, _So now he is not only on Konoha's to-kill list, but every other country's?_

I opened my mouth, trying to think of something to say, just so maybe he could keep talking and temporarily forget about killing us. However, no sound came out, because Falcon beat me first, except, he wasn't talking to him, he was talking to me.

"Stop listening to him. Control your emotions, Rabbit. Remember your identity. Remember your mission." He placed a hand on my shoulder and forcibly calmed me down. I didn't even realise my body was shaking until something stable and firm clutched onto my shoulder.

"Why can't unimportant insects just shut up. This discussion doesn't include you." The effeminate voice said coldly. There it was again, the sound of something shrieking through the air. I brought up my swords awkwardly and blocked Orochimaru's retractable sword aiming straight for Falcon's neck.

I heard Falcon let out a loud curse as another snake sneaked up behind him and launched a sword between its teeth. The blade barely scraped his arm, but from his sour face, I could only imagine the blade contained the same poison as a snake bite.

"Leave him out of it." I pushed the words out of my mouth as the at-least-fifty-meters-long sword slithered back to Orochimaru in snake form. Despite the rustling of the leaves and the hissing of the snakes, I could clearly hear the slow and constant ' _drip, drip, drip'_ when blood rolled down from my cheek onto the forest ground. It was so melodious I thought I could drift into oblivion if not for the immense danger around us.

"It's all up to you now, Uchiha-hime. Maybe you need a bit more incentive. Let's see, how about…" _I shouldn't listen to him, I really shouldn't. He is manipulative, and what I am doing is only giving him more advantages than he already has._ "... Sasuke, the little brother you left back in Konoha, with no power or clan to protect him?" _Oh, he is dead._

I slammed my hands onto the ground and screamed. The ground seemed to shake and howl with me as I pushed all of my rage, all of my fury, and all of my energy into my eyes. I was vaguely aware of the giant silver skeleton that arose from my body. The silver ribcage guarded me in a five-metre radius, evaporating every slithering and disgusting snake in the vicinity.

The silver sheen wrapped around me like silk under the moonlight. I felt so safe, yet everything hurt so much.

"Don't you dare lay a hand on Sasuke! If you so much as touch a hair on his head, I will hunt you down until the last bits of your filthy soul is annihilated!" I growled at him, hearing my voice echo through the skeleton giant. Really, I already had so little that was anchoring me to my life, I don't mind setting another goal.

I pushed down the waves of burning sensation in my body that made me feel like every vessel, every muscle was being ripped apart and reformed just so that it could be ripped apart again. I stared at Orochimaru with so much rage his eyes widened, whether from the fear or the shock or if he was simply amused, I had no idea.

The skeleton moved abruptly, swinging its giant bony arm towards the Snake Sannin. I saw the fist slam into his body so fast that he almost broke in two if his rubbery body didn't have its modifications. He crashed into some trees nearby, sending the dust, leaves and wooden splinters flying in the air.

When the smoke cleared, I could clearly see Orochimaru glaring at me with a venomous gaze. His battered body was almost snapped in half, with only a wilted and saggy connection in between. He was already melting his body into the ground, but I wasn't finished. Like hell I would let him run away.

The other giant arm aimed right for his mangled body, grabbing the sannin out of the ground and slammed it into another dozen trees. My vision was blurred by a crimson redness, and I wasn't even sure if it was because of the blood dripping out my eyes or just pure anger, maybe even both. The ground trembled, but I paid it no attention; another large crater formed in the forest floor, I paid it no attention; the pain in my body was so excruciating and agonising, it felt like all my chakra, all my life, and all my future were being drained out of it. The funniest thing was, I didn't even have a single clue as to what the silver skeletal warrior was.

I was sure what I was doing was filled with barbaric cruelty, but I didn't care; at that moment, it was all justified to me. For the sixth time, I locked his body in the large, bony fist, and slammed him to the ground, relishing the feeling of the body in the grip being smashed into mush. _Why is there no blood? Every organ, every piece of bone in his body should have been broken. Why wouldn't he just die!_

I was keenly aware that I was very close to tipping over that cliff into insanity, but it felt like I was just a spectator, watching as the story unfolds, not lifting a finger to stop it. I paused a bit to regain my breath. My entire leg was numb now, and I slumped to support myself on the ground. However it seemed to have no effect on the movement of the skeleton; as long as I willed it, it would move, under the condition that I could take the pain it caused me.

The moment I paused, the mushy flesh in my grip suddenly dissolved. Yes, it dissolved into a horde of snakes, rushing out of the silver chakra-formed hand. It disappeared so fast in the forest before I could even blink.

I screamed and yelled, feeling frustrated at Orochimaru's escape. I hopped like an idiot, crawling, doing whatever I could to venture into the forest. _I need to catch him, or else I will lose my only source of information about Itachi; I need to kill him, or else he will harm Sasuke when I am not by his side._

"Stop! Rabbit, your chakra level is close to depletion, and the paralysis poison is spreading. Captain and the rest of our team will be here soon, and we need to retreat and regroup while you still have the strength to do so." _Whose voice was that again? I can't think…_ I turned around in confusion, seeing the man clutching onto his arm, standing in the clearing around twenty meters away, surrounded by the craters I made by bashing the snake sannin's body violently into the ground.

 _Right, he is Falcon. He is my teammate. My team… they should be here soon. My comrades… my captain…_

"But he…" _He threatened to kill Sasuke, he threatened to hurt my brothers._ "And I…" _I want to kill him, is that really that hard to wish for?_

It was all very soon, and it all happened within the time I tried to clear away the dizziness in my disoriented mind. There was one snake. Just one. It slithered behind Falcon at a speed faster than any of us could comprehend. Falcon was staring at me with an almost pleading gaze, so he didn't see the glistening sword shooting out of that one, tiny, thin snake's mouth.

But I did. I saw the glistening sharp blade, aiming for his heart.

 _One decision to make. One life to save… I hate decisions._

Just like that, I let the silver warrior faded around me and I refocused my left eye on the snake and the blade. _This was my last chance, my last Kannon Bosatsu for a very long time. And I am going to use it to save my teammate._

I felt my last surge of chakra rushing to my left eye, sucking up all that's left of me. With one widening of my eye, the blade from the snake's jaw froze at the last moment before it could penetrate Falcon's chest. _Damn it, it better be worth it, he better never ever mention that incident with sake a year ago._

 _Run, run away! Get the hell out of here so I can close my eyes!_ I wanted to yell at him so badly, but the voice wouldn't come out. My body was falling apart, and I had no idea how I was still standing since I had no control over my muscles whatsoever. The only thing I was conscious of right now was to keep my eyes open. I couldn't falter or close them, or the jutsu would disappear if I lost focus. So I kept them open, despite the blood dripping out of my eyes and the burning pain.

He was staring at me with wide eyes, then he yelled something, but I couldn't hear him, it's was all just so blurry and fuzzy. I vaguely saw him running, _good,_ I thought, _he is out of the range and maybe I can let go now._

Why was he running towards me? He was yelling again, but I couldn't understand what he was saying. My left eyesight was slowly disappearing, I could just imagine the scene where the last flower petal disappearing around my pupil.

' _Splash'_ I heard something. It was the sound of a spray of liquid splashing onto the ground. I smelled… blood, but there was so much blood today that it might just be an aftertaste. _But it smells so strong._ I felt something cold in my chest, and it seemed like it was freezing my body, turning my already excruciating and tired body into an ice statue. I couldn't move at all as the sensation of liquid running down my body, soaking my clothes. The smell of blood was so pungent, I didn't know why it was so strong. Then, it all made sense when I dropped my head down out of exhaustion.

A metallic blade was sticking out of my chest, making the bright red blood gushing down my torso.

I heard it, the sound of a thousand birds chirping. I saw it, the column of wooden pillars racing up across the corner of my right eye. Somehow, even if I was currently being impaled by a sword, I felt a sense of relief. _Is this the feeling of hope and trust? Too bad I won't be here to here to enjoy it._

 _Ah, so I saved one person. That's good enough for atonement right? Although it probably wouldn't get me out of hell. One against thousands… that's such a tippy scale. So I guess it's my one way trip to hell then. Somehow, the second time… it isn't as scary anymore…_

 _Sometimes, I just need a break from life. And, maybe, just maybe, I will regain some strength to kill Orochimaru when I wake up again._

 _Later. Maybe later._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

He was late. Again.

He was always late. Whether it was intentional or not, he could never seem to make it on time when it really counted. Such irony, considering the ability of his mangekyou sharingan was Kamui, a time-space jutsu that can teleport what he saw, but never himself.

So when he saw the signal flare flashing into the sky a few kilometres away, he felt a sense of dread washing over him. _Please don't let it be Orochimaru,_ he was chanting silently as he flashed Zebra a signal to pursue the flare.

Of course, something just had to explode, there just had to be a bunch of unplanned explosions. He could have sworn that when they left the cave, there were flashes of snakes at the corner of his eyes. Yes, snakes at Orochimaru's hideout, that was never a good sign. He didn't even have the time to think about the symbolism and irony that this whole situation so absurdly presented before a shit load of dirt and trees exploded into pieces.

The medic-nin beside him cursed as they dodged the incoming rocks and pieces of wood. The annoying sound of explosions and the flying dirt were making the direction of the flare hard to tell, but Kakashi had a summoning contract with dogs, so he could smell his teammates a mile away. Right now, he was certain that Falcon and Rabbit were the ones that sent the signal flare. He knew immediately that the mission had gone wrong, but he still prayed that he was wrong. There had been a few tricky situations in missions ever since Rabbit joined two years ago, but it had never gone so badly that one of his team members died (hospital trip was another story), and he would like to keep it that way, no matter how absurd that sounded.

He raced through the jungle, heading towards where the flare was shot. When they joined up with Otter and Bear on the way, it was obvious that something was very wrong, because they could all see the giant silver skeleton rising above the trees, smashing the forest floor, sending so much dust and rock into the air that the earlier explosions would have paled in comparison.

 _Is that…_ Kakashi had to squint his sharingan to clearly see the body-shaped mass in the skeleton's swift-moving fist. But in the end, he was sure that the unknown body mass was Orochimaru. He could never forget the horror he received from the treacherous sannin.

For a second, he wasn't sure what to think of the situation. Orochimaru was here, and that meant the worst he had feared really did come true. However, the situation at hand seemed like someone or something was really making Orochimaru's life hellish, judging by the horrible shape his body was in, albeit the fact that Orochimaru's body wasn't normal in the first place.

So the best thing he could do was to lead his team and race to the battlefield as fast as possible, preferably before the silver skeleton killed his teammates, but after it killed Orochimaru.

He was late.

The first thing he saw were the snakes, the tiny brown snakes that seemed to sneak up on everybody. Then, he saw red.

A girl was impaled by a sword that was attached to one of the snakes' mouth. The blade went through her chest from the back to the front, as blood gushed out of her torso. It wasn't long before he and Bear used wood release and Chidori to clear the area of the snakes with deadly blades. It might have been a bit of overkill, but if only saving a comrade was as simple as killing the enemy.

It wasn't until Zebra and Otter pulled the girl's lifeless body out of the blade that he really saw how much damage she had taken. The first thing that popped into his eyes were the two streaks of red dripping down her cheeks all the way from her eyes to her neck. Then it was the pale, unhealthy colour of her skin, showing just how much she had exhausted of her own chakra supplies. Finally, his eyes moved to the gaping wound in her chest.

Zebra was trying to stop the bleeding and heal the wound as Otter gently placed the girl on the ground, providing the medic-nin with a flat surface to work with. Kakashi was no medic, so he didn't know the extent of her wound. But anyone with an eye could tell that this amount of blood lost - a pool of red formed under her body - could not have been anything less than a fatal injury.

Bear made a makeshift wooden dome that engulfed all of them and disguised it with trees; Falcon was sitting on the ground, panting heavily; Otter and Kakashi watched Zebra work on restoring the youngest member of the team attentively. There was a heavier and stronger sense of dread that silenced all of them, and Kakashi knew that as the captain, he had to do something about this.

"Falcon, what is the extent of your injury." He asked as calm and collected as he could, which was not a hard task, considering the many missions he had led. When he asked his subordinates about their injuries, he expected honest answers. He knew that all of his team members knew how stupid it was for them to act like a hero, but then die of severe blood loss.

"Mostly superficial. My left arm is paralysed by a poison from the snakes, but other than that, there are no heavy injuries." Falcon answered him, and Kakashi trusted his answers, considering he had been his teammate for more than eight years. There was an uncomfortable silence as they both moved their eyes towards the centre of the dome, where their last fallen comrade laid.

As if reading their minds, which Kakashi doubt was very subtle at the moment, Zebra said without lifting his eyes away from his patient, "The blade barely missed her heart, but several of her large blood vessels are seriously damaged, as well as a pierced lung. I am going to perform an emergency surgery to repair the damages. But considering her body condition right now with her chakra level depleted, her heart is most likely going to give out in the middle of the surgery."

With the tiny reassurance from Zebra's word, Kakashi could actually calm down and see that the wound was way too far to the left and up for it to punctured the heart. In fact, if Kakashi wanted to feel better, he could tell himself that it was a hit to the shoulder. _It's a small chance, but damn it, just take it._

Immediately, Bear created a wooden surgery table, and somehow, they were able to move her onto the table without worsening her condition. They gave Zebra silence and space as he worked intensely on the patient. Kakashi was suddenly glad that Zebra had packed extra supplies for performing difficult field surgeries, which was something they had prepared in case something were to happen on their escort mission. This was not the way he expected those tools would be used. The only person allowed near Zebra was Otter, who was the closest thing they had now to an assistant surgeon. The others followed Kakashi to the side, where they started the terrifying task of figuring out what the hell happened.

"Debrief us what happened, Falcon." He ordered. There was a pause in their conversation as Falcon had to take a breath before starting the explanation.

"When we finished cleaning up the area, we were ambushed by… Orochimaru. It almost seemed like he was waiting for us, or more specifically, if I interpret the situation correctly, he was waiting for Rabbit." Falcon started slowly, furrowing his brows hard as if trying to make sense of the situation. Kakashi mentally froze at the revelation, _how the hell did the traitor sannin knew of their mission, and how the hell did the intelligence department not pick up on the signs of a lingering enemy._ He looked at Falcon expectedly, waiting for him to elaborate on his claims.

"If I remember correctly, Orochimaru claimed that he wanted her body." _Wait, what?_ Kakashi was quite conscious of the fact that his mind was probably racing a hundred miles an hour in a completely wrong and inappropriate direction. Judging by his poor little kouhai's stunned expression, he could only guess that Tenzō had somehow arrived at the same wrong and inappropriate conclusion.

Seeing their transparent thoughts, Falcon only shot them an annoying look before continuing, "Not the way you are thinking, I am pretty sure Orochimaru meant as a vessel, as in containers. I think he wanted to take over Rabbit's body, so he could have access to her skills and her sharingans." _Okay, that makes much more sense, not that the prospect of Orochimaru seeking a vessel body is any better._

"Orochimaru proceeded to taunt her with the Uchiha Massacre and Uchiha Itachi. You know, sensitive topics. So like an idiot, she engaged him in battle." Falcon explained with a sour tone. Kakashi had the urge to smack the girl on the head, but considering the fact that she is currently on the verge of life and death, he thought he'd let it pass. To be fair, he didn't think anyone could keep their cool if they were in Maiko's situation. Despite the coolness and aloofness the Uchihas displayed all the time, the fact that they have the sharingan proved that they loved and hated harder than anyone.

"Care to explain where the hell was Orochimaru when we arrived? Or what the hell was that giant skeleton?" Kakashi asked, raising an eyebrow. Falcon stayed silent for a moment, his face scrunched up in concentration, as if he couldn't remember what happened.

"I'm not completely sure what happened, but from my perspective, it looked like Rabbit was winning, right up until the last moment." Falcon pushed the words out of his mouth with so much uncertainty that Kakashi thought he was joking at first. Then he saw the seriousness in his eyes, "You're serious." He whispered with disbelief.

"Yes, I saw her using a black flame thingie that burned everything to dust, including the Rashōmon Gate. Then she used some jutsu to stop the freaking time, there were two instances where I thought I saw Orochimaru just freeze in place until she either decapitated him or put a twenty-centimetres hole in his chest. I don't know how he is not dead yet because he just regenerated from a cut-off neck." Falcon said frantically, yep, he was definitely panicking.

Kakashi had to mentally equate the 'black flame thingie' with Amaterasu and 'some jutsu to stop the freaking time' with Kannon Bosatsu. He just realised that moment that he never told any of his teammates about Maiko's eye abilities, and considering Maiko's social aloofness, she probably didn't tell any of them anyway. To be honest, he would probably prefer to keep it that way, he would rather that none of them would ever have to use their mangekyou sharingan, considering the strain it puts on the eyes.

"Then, when Orochimaru taunted her with her little brother, I think she just snapped." _Oh, that's never a good sign._ "She created, summoned, generated, or whatever, that giant silver skeleton. I swear that she just made the skeleton grab Orochimaru by the head and randomly smashed him around. You should have seen it, she bashed him around so hard that I am pretty sure that he was reduced to a pot of mush. Can anyone please tell me how the hell did she do that, because next time, I would like a warning to get out of the way." They were looking at him expectantly as if Kakashi had the answer to everything Uchiha related. Okay, maybe in this specific case, he did know something.

Kakashi sighed, "It's her sharingan, after it… evolved, it gives the user special abilities. The black flame and the time-space jutsu were two of them, but as for the silver skeleton, I have no idea what the hell that was. You are gonna have to ask her yourself when she wakes up." He used the word 'when', even if he knew that a better word would be 'if' because there was no guarantee that she would ever wake up. However, no one cared to point out the technicality, so he just let the words hang in the air.

"I tried to stop her from pursuing when Orochimaru literally dissolved into snakes. Maybe it was because of the chakra exhaustion, but the skeletal thingie disappeared just before I saw the sword. I don't get it, why didn't she just stop the time if she has that ability?" _Ah, here it was again, chakra exhaustion. She seems to get those a lot lately, straining herself on missions. I wouldn't say that she is passionate about missions, but she is certainly busying herself with them._ It was almost like she was trying to adopt the mission as her life, adopting her mask of "Rabbit" as her true identity.

Hell, he couldn't blame her, the real life was filled with emotional baggage and maybe a few years ago, he would have even agreed with her; being Hound was so much easier than being Hatake Kakashi. However, after more than a decade in Anbu, he had known for a fact that despite the seemingly anonymous system in the black ops, at the end of the day, he was still Hatake Kakashi, and she would still be Uchiha Maiko. True anonymity was a joke, especially for someone as high profile as the surviving Uchiha prodigy.

He shouldn't be surprised, after observing her for two years - out of Hokage-sama's order, not his own volition - he could clearly tell that she was cracking. Bits by bits and piece by piece. Kakashi was no medic, and he doubted that any medic could fix _this._ More than once, Kakashi thought that maybe he should just throw in the towel and push her over the edge, just so that she would shatter once and be done with it.

But now, there she was. Battered, cracked, shattered. Immediately, Kakashi regretted ever having thought that pushing her over the edge was a good idea (and having Orochimaru being the one to do it was definitely not in his training regime). Why? Simply because that Kakashi was scared of the unpredictable outcome.

This was not the only time that Kakashi felt uneasy around Uchiha Maiko. Sometimes, he was scared of her; other times, he was scared for her.

 _So I guess that a psych evaluation is in order after we get back, and she is definitely getting a lecture for disobeying the superior's order when she wakes up._ Again, he used the word "when" instead of "if", and he was too tired and stubborn to correct that.

"How many times did she use Kannon Bosatsu?" Kakashi asked, and when he caught Falcon's confused look, he had to remind himself that they didn't know what it was, "I mean, how many times did she use 'that thing that stops the time'?"

"Ehh, two times, I think…" Falcon scratched his neck to try to recall the events. It was getting quiet at the centre of the dome, but they weren't trying to concentrate on that.

"Three times." To everyone's surprise, it was Tenzō who spoke up. "When we arrived, I saw a snake with a sword in its mouth a few meters behind you. It was frozen in place, just like how you described. I didn't think too much about it at that moment, so I just swatted it away with wood pillars."

 _So that's what happened._ Kakashi turned to the centre of the dome, he could barely make out the blood trails on the girl's cheek. What the hell was she thinking? Using up all three times in one go. _Survival,_ a small voice whispered at the back of his head. She wouldn't be here if she didn't use all she had, instead, she would be strolling around as Orochimaru's host body. Actually, none of them would be here if she hadn't damaged Orochimaru to the point that he felt the need to dissolve his body and escape. They would all be dead.

When he returned his eyes to the teammate beside him, and he almost smacked himself after seeing the undeniable look of survivor's guilt on his face. _Okay, make that two therapy sessions when we get back._ He didn't know how to deal with emotional breakdowns or survivor's guilt for that matter. Yes, he had probably gone through most of those emotional traumas, but he absolutely knew nothing about how to deal with them. One aspect of being a captain which he sucked at.

"Captain." It was Zebra's chilling voice that broke through his thoughts. Suddenly, the dome was quiet, so quiet that Kakashi could clearly count the sound of everyone's heart beating. _One, two, three, four, five… there is one missing._

He could swear, that somewhere, Fate was watching him with a mocking laugh. The fact that he had a sharingan was the biggest irony of his life because he kept on watching Uchihas fall one by one into the abyss.

Zebra sounded once more, with panic and _a lot_ of fear in his shaking voice, "I can't feel her heartbeat anymore. I hope...the electricity... we need to start the resuscitation. I might… we can still save her."

 _This, this is all so maddening. And she? She is the most maddening Uchiha of them all._

* * *

A/N: So not a Merry Christmas for anyone in this chapter... Confession time, I was going to kill Falcon, but I feel bad for him as a collateral damage. Anyway, this shall not be the last fight between Orochimaru and Maiko, this time, they all have flaws, with Orochimaru underestimating his opponent and Maiko's lack of information is a huge disadvantage (I mean, how do you kill someone immortal, and sealing is definitely not in her skill set. The last time I checked, Orochimaru is still alive in canon... for some reason). Also, how does one practice their mangekyou sharingan without going blind? Anyways, the next time they fight, all of these flaws will be improved. Like Maiko said, she needs a new goal, and snake hunting sounds as good as any.

B/N: I like cats. But I'm severely allergic to them. Dammit. Meh, Zoe can be my cat for now, keke. Don't piss off an emotionally unstable girl. You're just asking for death. (Your lesson of the week.)

This is what happens when you let your beta take over the note for a day because it's near Christmas...


	24. Chapter 24 - Revenant

A/N: The last update in 2016. I wish you all a happy new year! Thank you all so much for staying with me for 2016, these past four months since I've started updating this story has been very interesting, and now, I shall carry on to 2017.

Beta'd by the joyous Alice J.

* * *

Chapter 24 - Revenant

 _Drip. Drip. Drip._

I couldn't feel anything. Actually, that was an incorrect observation, I could feel my body, I could feel my limbs, I could even feel my muscles contracting and relaxing. No, what I meant was, I couldn't feel anything _outside_ of my body. There was no wind brushing against my skin, there was no dust grazing against my hands. I couldn't even feel any part of my body touching the ground. It was almost like there was absolutely nothing in the atmosphere, no air, no oxygen. So that begged the question, how was I still alive.

It took an awfully long moment before I had the answer. I was simply not.

I was dead.

I opened my eyes and almost cringed at the sight before me. Everything was so fuzzy and shifty. Maybe I was too used to the world through the sharingans, but the scenery around me was simply not solid.

I had to squint my eyes for a while before I finally came to the realisation that it was not my eyesight that was fuzzy, but really the world around me was not even solid. I vaguely saw the shapes of trees far away, the greens blended lightly with the blue sky and the brown trunks; the rocks still looked jagged, but I wasn't even sure if that was the shape, it looked like it was constantly shifting. I looked down at the brownish-grey dirt under my feet, I couldn't feel it at all, but it looked like the dirt particles were flowing, a kind of fluid instead of solid earth. Everything was moving at such a minuscule level that I felt like I was in an impressionist painting, the environment surreal but recognisable at the same time.

A sense of familiarity struck me as I recognised the way the lines of trees curved over a clearing, but it was still thick enough to obscure people's view. This was _the_ training ground, the one where Itachi, Shisui and I frequented when we still children.

I was so confused. I had died once, not that it was something I should be proud of, but I clearly remembered the flow of misery and emotions that had drowned me until I couldn't take it anymore. But this, this was so tranquil and peaceful.

 _So am I dead, or am I not dead? Am I in hell? Nirvana? Railway station?_

"Yo."

I froze completely at the sudden voice in front of me. Slowly, I raised my head forward, reaching past the shifting trees and skylines, directly at the figure sitting on the ever changing rock. Unlike everything else, he seemed solid, but that wasn't the point right now, because if I had a heartbeat right now, it would have stopped and then started to pound more furiously than ever.

"Shi...sui…" I whispered with such disbelief and uncertainty that it sounded more like a delirious mumble than a statement.

"Who else could it be?" The boy said with a familiar grin. The spiky raven black hair, the signature tear trough under his eyes, and that familiar Uchiha high-collar shirt. I stared at him rudely, unsure of what to answer.

There was a light chuckle and I saw the fleeting image of Shisui's charismatic smile dancing on the boy's face. _This has to be a joke, maybe a genjutsu. Someone is messing with my mind._ I wanted to move closer, to inspect the image before me. I had the instinctual urge of drawing my blades, but when my hands arrived at my back, I realised, I didn't have my swords.

In fact, now that I was conscious, I realised that I was wearing the standard Anbu uniform, minus the swords and the weapon pouch, and my Rabbit mask was hanging by my belt. I clearly remembered that when I died, I was wearing the Konoha Chunin jacket, without my mask. But despite the strange fact, I desperately wanted to bring the mask up to cover my face - to cover everything.

Before I could step towards the suspicious "Shisui" figure in front of me, he appeared in front of me at lightning speed. Suddenly, my brain flashed the title that was given to my friend, 'Shisui of the Body Flicker'. Somehow, this scene was familiar. Nostalgic.

"Still looking as pretty as ever, Hime," Shisui-but-maybe-not whispered in a playful voice, his body towering over me, his eyes looked down at me with a teasing glint. I didn't know how to respond, in fact, I was pretty sure there were some gasps and strangled choking sounds escaping my mouth. Never mind, this was not tranquil and peaceful.

"I…you…what?" I managed to utter some incoherent words, but I thought that it expressed my confusion and disbelief pretty well. 'Shisui' gave me another chuckle before crossing his arms in front of his chest and shook his head lightly.

"Calm down. First, what is my name?" He asked lightly.

"Shisui?" I answered with a small voice. This had to be some trap, there was no way he could have been here, looking exactly like the way he was two years ago, not a single day older than sixteen.

"The one and only." He seemed very amused at my confusion.

"But how? You are dead, right?" I couldn't keep that tiny spark of hope away from my shaky voice. He didn't answer me, instead, he gave me a sad look. The sorrow seemed to be bleeding out of his dark onyx eyes. Suddenly, I remembered. I died, so if he was here, then he must have died as well. Just like that, the spark of hope diminished.

"So I guess that I am dead as well. Any direction to the afterlife, or am I stuck in hell?" I tried to keep the tone light as a joke, but I guess there was a reason why I wasn't known for my humour. I could feel the sarcasm and rage oozing out of my voice as Shisui stared at me with a frown, so unlike his usual optimistic expressions.

"If it makes you feel any better, I am just as clueless as you are." I looked at Shisui's crackling smile, unimpressed. No, it didn't make me feel any better.

"Okay, to be fair, I don't think you are dead, yet. Look at your leg." Shisui pointed at my feet and I followed the direction of his finger. Indeed, there was a thin red line wrapped around my right ankle. My gaze followed the red thread, watching it disappear into the impressionistic world. When I turned my attention back to Shisui, I realised there was nothing connected to his body. He looked lost, nothing was anchoring him down in this ever-shifting world. For a second, he looked so alone.

"See, you are different from me, and I know I am dead, hell, I even made sure of it…" His voice faltered when I raised my eyes and glared at him accusingly. I didn't know what he saw in my eyes that made him freeze, betrayal? Sadness? Anger?

 _Drip, drip, drip._ The landscape was silent, except for the sound of water dripping from Kami knows where. I closed my eyes lightly and slowly took a breath.

"You know, Shisui, you are such a liar." I muttered slowly as I opened my eyes again, "All the way from the beginning." He looked like he wanted to say something, but I held up my finger and placed it on his lips and stopped him.

"I know that it was on your parents' and the elders' orders that you approached Itachi and me, what did they say? Befriend us? Bewitch us? Control us?" I said, letting out the thoughts I had been hiding ever since his death, "But it's fine, I trust you. I know you really cared for Itachi, I knew, after a while, that you were not just pretending to be close to him, and I am so grateful for that…"

"Maiko, I…"

"No, just don't say anything. I don't have the right to judge you. At least you turned some lies into truth, and I was lying all along. Just spinning and spinning and spinning… now, see where it led me." I managed to squeeze in a smile as I retracted my hands. _Is it finally time? Do I finally have the courage to spill out all my secrets? It's fine, isn't it? No matter how I look at it, there's no way I can be alive anymore._

"I don't exist, really, I was someone else before I was Uchiha Maiko, someone so insignificant that I didn't even have a name. I don't even belong here. I died, so I came into Uchiha Maiko's body and lived her life for her, apparently made all the wrong choices in the process. And look at her now, dead, ruined, I ran her life into the ground and watched it burn." I sounded hysterical, and I didn't even dare to look at Shisui's eyes. _What will he think of me? That I am crazy? Well, I won't deny it. He will probably hate me, Uchiha Maiko is his family, and I am not…_

"You probably hate me so much right now, and I don't blame you." I was totally rambling in shame. _I lied so much, to everyone. Shisui cared about Uchiha Maiko, and he must hate me so much for taking over her body._

"So, tell me if I'm getting this right, but who exactly is it that I meant when I was nine? You, or Uchiha Maiko?" I raised my head ever so slightly to see the confused look he gave me.

"Um, me? Like I said, I was in her body since she was born, I think?"

"Okay? Then, I don't see any problem. You are the one I know, does it really matter what you are called?" Just to make sure I was hearing him right, I raised my head higher and saw the brilliant smile he gave me.

"I don't think you are getting this right…"

"Oh trust me, I think I'm getting this, maybe a bit confused. I think it's you who are not getting it. But if it makes you feel better, hi, I'm Ghostly Shisui, or Shisui if you think that's too long. Nice to meet you. Since you said that you don't have a name, can I just call you Hime?" I stared at his outstretched hand for a very long period of time, before I realised that he was just teasing me.

"Ah, you really are Shisui. I can never follow your logic," I muttered as I covered my face in embarrassment. _Why the hell am I embarrassed when I'm dead? Who the hell made the rules about the realm of limbo in the world anyway? We need to talk._

"It was true that the elders ordered me to approach the two of you. They didn't want two genius children being so uncontrolled. My parents and uncles, being so attracted to status and power, naturally agreed. But the moment I first met you, I knew you were different. You were so much more mature and intelligent that even all the children my age paled in comparison to you. I had my suspicions, and I guess I now know why. Trust me, after I got here, let's just say that I've become more inclined to believe in crazy stuff." He continued to smile, it was so bright that I thought the sun couldn't even compare to it. _He really is Shisui, his optimistic aura makes everything else look cold in comparison._

"I don't care about your name, I don't care about your status in the Uchiha Clan. You can be Maiko, or you can be Rabbit," he eyed the rabbit mask on my waist, "or you could be someone else, I don't care. You will always be Hime to me, you will always be precious to me, so don't you ever forget that." Gently, he wiped away a droplet of tear that was running down my cheek, and I didn't even know when I started crying.

"So what happens now, I know you said I'm not dead yet, but it doesn't look like I am alive because you know…" I motioned my hands towards him. He laughed warmly, and I heard myself letting out a small chuckle.

"I think that depends on you. I committed suicide, you probably heard that. After I died, I was stuck here, not very long, though, at least not from my perspective, but seeing you all grown up into a beauty, I think it might have been a bit longer than a few days." He winked at me in a very 'Shisui' way that really made me want to laugh with him or slap him.

"Two years. It's been two years since you died, and it's been two years since Itachi…" This time, my voice faltered.

"Wait, what happened to Itachi?" I turned my attention to Shisui sharply and eyed him with disbelief. _How could he not know about it, I thought he and Itachi planned it together._

"Do you really not know?" I asked him, but all I received was a confused and worried expression, "The communication here is crap, as you can see, so please, enlighten me." Slowly, I drew a huge breath before finding the courage to retell the story.

"The night after your death, Itachi massacred the whole Uchiha Clan." I heard a sharp intake of breath from the boy in front of me. I paused a bit before adding another sentence. "He killed them all, Shisui. Sasuke and I are the only Uchihas left, and Itachi went rogue afterwards."

 _Drip, drip, drip._ Why did I always hear the sound of water droplets whenever we were silent? I wanted to look around frantically to search for the source because the dripping sound was driving me crazy, but I couldn't. I had to keep my eyes on Shisui's shocked face. I would never say Shisui was an easy person to read. Despite his openness and bright smiles, he was seasoned and experienced at keeping his emotions in check. However, at this moment, I could see every type of emotion emerge on his face. Surprise. Disbelief. Sorrow. Regret… and, understanding. _He knows why._

"You know the reason," I whispered, it wasn't a question, it was a statement. Shisui snapped out of his thoughts and looked at me, but he had trouble maintaining the eye contact when it was full of apologetic guilt.

"Tell me Shisui. Tell me." I ordered in my shaky voice, but he said nothing. "Please…" but he refused to open his mouth. "Why won't you tell me, Shisui? Why? what's there to hide? We are all dead!" Finally, I yelled at him as I snapped in anger.

"But you are not dead, Maiko, you still have a chance to live. Your connection with the living world has not been severed yet, you can still go back." He was pleading with me, eyes full of pain and remorse.

"So what! What does that have anything to do with the answer! Every day, for the last two years, it's all I can think about! Every minute of my life, I was trapped by this bullshit! I want to know, Shisui! What the hell happened that ruined our lives?" I screamed at him in rage, pounding my hands furiously at his chest and he let me punch him. Eventually, he caught my hands and stopped my attacks with a strong grip.

"Exactly, Maiko. If you knew the answer, what's keeping you in the world of the living? What's keeping you from giving up on life?" He looked into my eyes with dead seriousness. For a moment, I couldn't answer him. _He's right, what's keeping me from losing my motivation to live? It's the only thing keeping me going after all…_ Suddenly I remembered Akira-shishou's warning when I told him I was putting all my dreams and goals on the answer. _But I can't die, there's Sasuke, he will be chewed alive by the council if I am not there as his guardian. I promised I would protect him, and just now I was planning to throw all that away._

"I'm just so tired… I'm so tired at this… sometimes, I don't even think I can go on. I lie to my teammates, I lie to Shun and I lie to my brother. I am alone in this. Just me, and no one else understands… " I let my arms drop and grabbed onto his shirt to keep myself from falling. I felt a few droplets of liquid fall from my eyes, and unlike the metallic taste, this time, I felt the bitter saltiness in my mouth. _Ah, I thought we are supposed to be in a limbo, so why does the sorrow taste so real?_

"I know… I know. Don't cry, it breaks my heart to see that." He wrapped his arms around me and gently patted my back. "I trust that you can break through this, the Uchiha-hime I know would have beaten the crap out of everyone that dared to give her trouble. Itachi, he has his reasons, I don't quite agree with how he fixed it, but I know he had no choice." He let his voice drift off as I steadied my posture and looked into his eyes again.

"I think you are mature and intelligent enough to see past appearances, and we both know that Itachi has always had a reason for his actions, so go find it. Once you do, please, think carefully. It may not be what you wish to find, but I trust you to do what you need to do." Shisui's gentle voice flew around me. It sounded like he was giving a hint, but it didn't mean anything. At least not at the moment.

"Will I ever see you again?" I asked, even if I already knew the answer. I was going back to the world of the living, alone; I was going on the perilous and tiring journey to find my answer. It didn't sound like much of a life, did it? But I had to. Because this was my decision; because this was the promise I made to Shisui.

"Probably not. I believe I was stuck here for a reason. It's because I had so many unresolved regrets with you and Itachi. However, after meeting you, I think I know the paths you two have decided to take, and for the most part, my regrets have been lightened. So now, I have to go." He announced in a sad voice. As expected, his solid looking figure began to shift ever so slightly, it was as if he was dissolving slowly by the second.

"For the most part?" I inquired, raising my eyebrow at his choice of words, and he just gave me a smirk.

"Ah, you know, it makes me regret to no bounds knowing that you will be snatched up by some other random guy. So I might as well stake my claim first." Suddenly, he placed his arms on my shoulder and leant forward. I felt a small, chaste kiss on my forehead; it only lingered for a few seconds before he pulled away and hugged me, placing his head on my shoulder. The kiss held more affection than just between friend, it was closer to the love between siblings, I supposed. But I couldn't understand it, and now, I might never understand it.

It was kind of sad, that even in death, some things couldn't be said in the open.

"Live happily Maiko, no matter how much you think you don't deserve it. To me, you deserve every bit of joy and happiness that a princess should have. It's your life, your future, so you should live it for yourself, not anyone or anything else." Shisui whispered by my ears, and just like that, I felt my tears falling again.

 _Unfair, that's easier said than done, especially since I have no clue who the hell I am. Unfair, that he gets to waltz in here, make a demand, and then waltz away._

And the worst part was, I might actually believe that what he said was possible.

Finally, after Kami knows how long, he pulled away. His body was already starting to disintegrate into dust and swirls, blending into the impressionist painting that surrounded us. I was right, the red thread was the anchor, and Shisui, who had no anchor, had no way of staying in this constantly shifting world.

"Sayonara, Shisui-senpai," I whispered to him, giving him a smile despite the tears running down my cheeks. The sixteen-year-old boy in front of me beamed brightly, like a star that lit up the pathway for the lost.

"Sayonara, Hime." His voice echoed back to me. That was the last thing he said before he disappeared completely into the surroundings, and he said it with a smile.

I stood for a minute, an hour, or Kami knows how long, staring into the void where Shisui had disappeared to. The tears had long stopped falling, but I didn't feel like moving.

With one last look, I turned around and faced the direction where the red thread was leading. Silently but steadily, I walked down the path paved out for me.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

His hands were shaking, still having the light seizure from multiple bouts of crackling electricity. Despite the sweat plastered on his face and the fact that he was so hectic and tired, Kakashi decided that it was worth it. Because after so many rounds of resuscitation and defibrillation, finally, Uchiha Maiko's heart was beating once more.

"Her condition should be stabilised, but we need to get her to the hospital," Zebra said calmly as he placed his fingers on the girl's pulse. "Okay, her chakra is recovering steadily, now we just need to worry about the blood supply."

 _Good, it's all worth it._ Kakashi confirmed as he stood up from the ground and shot Zebra a grateful look. If he saw it, then he didn't show any sign of it. _So that begs the question of what now? I am supposed to be the captain, so now I need to take charge._

"We are leaving. We have a ten-hour journey back to Konoha and everyone is going home. Bear, vanguard. Otter will be on the side. Falcon, stay with Zebra in the middle and get your arm looked at. Bear, if you will." On his cue, Bear made a secure stretcher from his wood release. Sometimes, Kakashi would tease his Kouhai that he would make a successful sculpture career, and most of those times, he really meant it. Kakashi thought about using his Kamui to transport Maiko, but he wasn't sure if he could pull her out if there was an emergency, without shredding her into pieces, especially considering how chakra deprived he would be.

"Let's move Team Ro, we have an A-rank mission to report to Hokage-sama." Kakashi had to remind himself the severity of the situation at hand to stop himself from laughing at the hilarious comment he just made. A-rank? This was definitely going on an S-rank mission roll. In less than half a day, they had engaged in battle with the most notorious S-rank Konoha missing-nin who could apparently regenerate from the dead; they also gathered information about another S-rank traitor which could potentially affect not just Konoha, but all the foreign villages as well. An international criminal organisation full of S-rank missing-nin did not bode well for foreign relations.

Kakashi could already feel the harsh wind blowing; he could smell the crackling of electricity in the air. There was a storm slowly approaching, even if it was only at the stage of premonition right now.

When they returned to the village, there would be questions, lots of them, hard and difficult to answer. The worst part of it, they would be directed towards the fourteen-year-old girl who just took a stroll with Death.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

When I first woke up, I gasped eagerly for the oxygen, willing it to fill my lungs. I was alive, I could breathe, I could even feel the chakra flowing warmly throughout my body. _Yes,_ I confirmed one more time, _I am alive._

 _Drip. Drip. Drip._ I wanted to smack something because that annoying sound of dripping water was back. Slowly, I opened my eyes unwillingly; I didn't want to be back yet, the reality was painful.

When I saw the pure white wall in front of me, I had two thoughts circulating in my head. _Shit, I'm back in the hospital again_ and _Thank god, I'm back in the hospital, not some random place in the forest_.

It only took me a second to realise that something was wrong with my left eye. As a sharingan user, one of the most important skills I had was the analysis of the field of vision. I could clearly tell that my left field of vision was obstructed. Painfully, against the soreness in my muscles, probably from another bout of chakra exhaustion, I raised my left hand and touched my left eye.

The eyeball was still there, and there weren't any bandages around it, which meant there was no external damage to my eye. Maybe my eyesight was just fuzzy, maybe I hit my head or something. That was a wishful thought, but quickly I remembered that I did use my left eye's ability three times already, and looking at the rate I spammed it around in less than half an hour, it would probably take around two months for just the first petal to regenerate.

I sighed as I put my hand down and flopped my head back onto the soft pillow. _Drip, drip, drip._ I turned my head towards my left to get a better look at what the hell in the world was dripping. Imagine my annoyance when I realised that it was the IV infusion by my bed.

 _Drip, drip, drip._ I swatted my hands towards the IV bag in an attempt to stop the water from dripping. My hand missed, partly because one eye did not give me any depth perception, and partly because it was actually out of my reach. I tried three more times, but only once did I manage to touch the IV bag, yet I still couldn't stop the liquid dripping at the rate of one droplet at a time.

"What are you doing?" I turned my head towards the new voice in my room. Good, there was something else to listen to other than the dripping sound, but I was really looking for the absolute silence so my head would hurt less.

"The dripping sound of the IV, it's driving me crazy. Can you turn it off?" I said to Otter, who stepped into my room, probably through the window, in a normal Konoha shinobi outfit, without the Anbu mask on.

"You know it's there to make sure you heal faster right?" The woman looked at me incredulously, as if I had gone senile.

"Yes, I know what's it for, but it's annoying me, can you turn it off for me, please?" I asked nicely this time, but she was still staring at me unimpressed.

"Zebra! Can you take a look at this thing, I think something is wrong with her head." To my dismay, Otter gave a large yell at the window. Soon, a few black blurs busted through the window and landed in my crowded room. All five of my Anbu teammates were now standing in my room, all of them unmasked and out of their Anbu uniforms. Out of pure exasperation, I flopped back down again and sighed. _Remind me again why I decided to come back? Right, my brother and my future._

"I am not going insane, the dripping sound of water is just giving me a headache. Much like the lot of you cramming in my six square meters hospital room." I muttered, and soon, I could hear chuckles sound across the room, most likely from Falcon and Otter.

"Bad day?" Otter asked, trying to contain her laughter.

"Yeah, waking up from being impaled can do that to you. I'm serious, can somebody please turn off the IV, just for a little while, missing a bit of salt water is not going to make much of a difference. How long was I out anyway?" I asked as I opened my eyes. I saw someone - Zebra - walk towards my bed and I was hopeful that maybe he was going to turn off my IV.

"Seven days. You are ridiculously stupid sometimes, you know that? Stop worrying about the IV and keep still, medic's order." Zebra shushed me as he examined my heartbeat and pulse. "You had a surgery as soon as we got you back to Konoha, you are lucky the sword didn't pierce your heart, but it still took a ton of blood supplies to save you. Anything else you're feeling wrong, aside from the obvious of course?"

I debated whether or not to tell him about my eye, since technically, that was very important. However, before I could even finish the thought, he already started to shine flashlights in my eyes to check my pupil movement. He checked my right eye first and I cringed at the bright light, but when he moved to my left eye, I couldn't see anything. It was a scary thought, I could feel the heat radiating on my eye but I couldn't see the obnoxiously bright light, especially for someone who relied on her vision so much.

"Can you see my right finger." Zebra frowned as he placed his finger on my far left, he probably already saw the unresponsiveness of my left pupil.

"No," I answered honestly. My remaining eye glossed over to my captain, the only person on my team whom I had told about my eye abilities, but his mask was making the expressions hard to see, especially now that I only had one eye.

"How long?" Kakashi asked me, not wasting a single word.

"Two months," I responded.

"Can you two stop communicating in code? I'm a medic, not a decoder." Zebra said with exasperation, and it's followed by the chorus of agreements in the room. I looked at Kakashi again, and when I saw him doing nothing, I sighed again.

"It's my eye's ability, my left eye can only be used three times max at one go, then it will turn temporarily blind for one or two months, I think." The last two words were not intentional, but with sharingan, I couldn't be sure of anything. Hell, I still hadn't figured out what that silver giant was.

"How does that work, though? Temporarily obstructed vision? It might be temporary inflammation of eye nerves due to overuse, but then it would mean the eye itself would have some unusual regeneration abilities… do you feel any pain at the back of your eye? Can you see anything? Shapes? Colours? Or nothing at all?" I slowly turned my head towards Zebra, who inquired with an almost feverish glint in his eyes as if he had just found his medical research project, and I was not sure how to respond to that.

"I have no idea, yes, no, no, no, no, and yes. Does it look any different from my other eye?" I answered his questions as swiftly as possible before asking one of my own. I was hoping that it wouldn't look drastically different, so it would be easier to hide.

"It's a bit lighter in colour, so a dark grey instead of black, but other than that, it's not very obvious." I sighed in relief as Zebra retreated back to where the majority of my teammates were standing. Suddenly, there was an awkward silence as I laid my eyes on my gloomy captain. Was it my imagination, or did he look especially gloomy today?

"What was my order, Rabbit?" Kakashi said in a deep voice as if a dark cloud had just passed over him. _Okay, definitely not my imagination then._

"Do not engage the enemy unless the backup is there. But we did send backup, if we did not defend ourselves, we would have gotten killed." I argued with a quiet voice. Orochimaru deserved to die. Maybe I had acted a bit rash and reckless, but my only regret was not being able to kill him.

"You engaged him excessively and you let your emotions run wild. I don't care what he did to provoke you nor who he used to provoke you. When you are in Anbu and on my team, I expect you to listen to commands. You should know that this could get you stripped of your rank and even charged for insubordination." He said to me coldly as I bit my lower lip lightly and clenched my fists tight under my bed covers. I couldn't risk being stripped of my position, it would not only interrupt my investigation, it would also leave Sasuke in a vulnerable position. _But he needs to die, Orochimaru needs to die for Sasuke to be safe. He is too large of a threat with too little information, and Sasuke, alone and young, would be an easy prey._

"I deeply apologise for my actions. I will take whatever punishment that comes for me." Finally, I spoke up. There was nothing I could do at the moment, the only thing I could do right now was to make sure things wouldn't get any worse.

"This is not my decision anymore." I snapped my head up at his emotionless voice. A small part of me screamed defiantly, I could always just run out of the village without a care in the world. Itachi went rogue, why couldn't I? _But in order to go rogue, he slaughtered a whole clan and left you with your only family._ Yeah, that was the reason.

"The mission has just been upgraded to S-rank mission now due to the encounter with Orochimaru, and it's no longer in my jurisdiction anymore. I have already turned in my report and evaluation, but it will be Hokage-sama's decision of how to deal with you. Do you understand?" Kakashi finished the sentence, and I couldn't tell if I should be relieved or even more worried.

"Hokage-sama will probably summon you in a few days, once your injuries are able to walk. Tell him every bit of truth, because right now, you need to offer every piece of information to get out of this. Clear?" Immediately I nodded, not that I was planning on holding anything back.

Quickly, my teammates left through the window and disappeared with no trails. We were Anbu, and we moved like winds with no trace; if only we could be as free as the wind.

Well, they all disappeared but one. Falcon stopped just before jumping out of the window, and after a moment of silence, he turned around. He looked like he wanted to say something, but he couldn't figure out how to say it under the serious atmosphere.

"Are you going to be the nice one and turn off the IV for me?" I asked hopefully, trying to break the tension in the air just a bit so the awkwardness could flow away.

"I would love to, but unfortunately Captain would kill me. Anyways, I know Captain sounds harsh, but I swear that he is worried about you. He's just really grumpy because he was holed up with the council and Hokage-sama for three days since you are not there to answer questions, but…"

"Falcon!" The remainder of Falcon's speech was drowned out by a very angry yell beyond the window.

"Yes, sir!" Immediately, Falcon let out a high pitch screeching sound. Despite the fact that their yells were so loud that they gave me migraines, seeing Falcon pale under Captain's anger was quite comical. For a second, I couldn't hold my laughter anymore, so I let out a snicker that seemed to surprise my teammate.

"Yeah, I should go. But before I leave, I thought you need something to pass time with, so I brought you this." Out of nowhere, Falcon pulled out a bottle of something and presented it in front of me. I had to squint my eyes a bit just to make sure that I was seeing it right.

"Out of everything you could have chosen for a get-well-soon present, you brought me a bottle of sake." Yes, I needed to hear myself say that to realise how ridiculous it sounded.

"Well yeah. Trust me, they are really good pain killers, especially for celebrating your survival. Also, I heard that the last time you tried it, you slept really well…"

"Get out." I was very close to grab the IV and chuck it at his face… if I could reach it. Nevertheless, Falcon seemed to get the idea because he immediately retreated back to the corner of the room, staying as far away from me as possible.

"Heard you loud and clear. I'll just leave it here." Awkwardly, he placed the bottle by the window and disappeared the moment he saw my death glare.

I stared at the bottle of alcohol, not sure whether to laugh or cry at whatever that just happened. _What exactly am I supposed to do with it, throw it at Falcon the next time he pisses me off?_

I did have a period of quietness and peace, minus the sound of my IV dripping. However, it was quickly interrupted by my second wave of visitors, and they weren't nearly as quiet as my first.

"Nee-chan!" My dear little brother bursted through the door, along with an equally energetic ball of orange, followed by my roommate with annoyance written all over his face.

"No yelling in the room, Sasuke, Naruto. I already have a headache." I said to them firmly, no matter how powerful Sasuke's puppy eyes were.

"What happened? Who did this to you? I will kill them." Sasuke took one look at me before he growled in anger and I narrowed my eyes at him. Despite the fact that Naruto was nodding eagerly beside him, I didn't think he understood what Sasuke actually meant.

"That's not your concern Sasuke, I'm fine, so don't worry about it," I said to him gently as I patted his head, rubbing his unruly spiky hairs. _Like hell I would let him be anywhere close to that snake._

"But一"

"No yelling remember." I stopped his argument quickly just as he was about to raise his voice. "How was your ninjutsu practice?" I changed the topic immediately, this time, with a gentler voice.

"It's going great, Mai-nee-chan! I can direct the Katon: Phoenix Sage Fire no problem now, and I extended the range of my Raiton: Electrifying Line to fifteen meters! Also…" Sasuke went on as his attention was drawn by the discussion of ninjutsu. I smiled at him as I listened to him telling me what he learned over the past ten days, and I could tell how hard he practised, even if no one was there to teach him.

"What about you, Naruto, how's your practice going?" I asked the blonde boy with faint curiosity. He was interesting, especially after I had seen the anger and hatred emitted from the Sand Jinchūriki, and I was very curious as to how he kept his sanity and his optimism. He was like the opposite of us Uchihas, bright, optimistic and carefree. He was an oddball, just like Shisui.

"Great, dattebayo! I won the taijutsu match in Academy today, thanks to your teaching! Also, you should have seen Mizuki-sensei's face when that bucket of sludge fell on his head, it was hilarious! By the way, Nee-chan, teme set the training ground on fire and he electrocuted the koi pond in Shikamaru's house." Naruto ended his speech with a smirk towards a furious Sasuke. I turned my attention to my little brother and stared him down.

"You electrocuted the Jonin Commander's koi pond? With koi fish in it? What did I tell you about control? And why the hell would you practice lightning jutsu near a water source?" I scolded him with fury in my voice. _Doesn't he know it's dangerous? Besides, do you know how hard it is to find free babysitting services these days? Yoshino-san is even willing to feed him!_ Suddenly, I had a feeling that I was slowly turning into mom - a very inadequate version.

"No, don't listen to that dobe, I did _not_ electrocute Shikamaru's koi pond, I just accidently touched it with my lightning chakra while I was practising with Shikamaru. I didn't even know there's a koi pond, and there was no koi fish in it…" His voice became smaller as he finished every sentence, probably because I was glaring at him like a mother hen. Eventually, he just gave up trying to convince me it wasn't his fault, but not before I caught him mumbling "It's not like you were careful when you were young."

"I heard that. I might be injured, but my ears are working just fine." I warned him with a chilling smile. With a shudder, Sasuke and Naruto ran out of my room like their tails were on fire, but I could still hear them arguing and blaming each other loudly in the hallway.

"He's right you know? Sometimes, you are even more stubborn than your brother. I don't know how many times you and Itachi beat the crap out of each other and burned the trees down under the guise of trying out new jutsus." Shun's nonchalant voice sounded before me, and I had to turn further to my left to give him a glare.

"I see you didn't change much. What stupidity did you commit this time?" Unfazed by my glare, he continued to tease me.

"I thought you knew everything, Shun." I retorted, maybe my glare worked better with two eyes.

"I said I know most things, not everything. Yes, what you did was really stupid, to the core, probably the most stupid thing you have done yet, and that says a lot with your track record in the hospital. What happened? I know you've been getting more chakra exhaustion from your missions lately." Suddenly, the playfulness in his voice was gone, and it turned into dead seriousness. I locked my eyes (or eye, considering I was currently half-blind) on him, and he stared back with his pale blue eyes. Neither of us was willing to break the glare and give up the battle.

"The missions are getting harder, that's all. What I am doing is for survival, so don't you dare go all psychiatrist on me." I said to him firmly. I had no idea how he got my health record, but then again, he was Shun. It wasn't only because of his last name that he got accepted into the Intelligence department so young.

"Fine, let's just say that I believe you. What will you do when you are retired, shinobi don't stay in Anbu forever, and they don't get A-rank assignments all their lives." Despite the usual calmness in Shun's voice, I narrowed my eyes at his words.

"If you are implying that I'm addicted to dangerous missions, then don't, because I'm not." I quickly answered, sounding a bit harsher than I intended.

"Damn it Maiko, I'm trying to help you. If you got a problem, then you need to ask for help." He was the one who broke the eye contact first, trying to speak some sense to me with a voice full of irritation and helplessness.

"Not right now, Shun. I can't deal with _this_ right now." I almost squeezed the sentence out word by word. I didn't know how many doses of painkillers they had injected me, but this argument was too much for my brain right now.

"That's not what I'm asking!"

"And this is my answer, take it or leave it." I didn't mean to yell at him, but it was already out before I could stop it. After the outburst, there was an uncomfortable silence, as if the tension in the air needed to be calmed first before either of us could speak another word without the room exploding.

"Nevermind, just come back soon. All of us are worried about you, and your tedious and bratty brother is complaining about my water jutsu and teaching skills. It's not my problem if he couldn't perform it right and ended up soaking himself." With a sad smile, he turned around and started to walk out of my room.

"I'm sorry," I said it o softly that I was sure it wouldn't travel more than a meter. But somehow, I knew he had heard me because his body stiffened and his steps halted for a fraction of a second. In the end, he walked out to catch the children without giving me any indication that he heard me.

We were retreating, back to the comfort zone, shoving the battle flag into the dark underground. It would still be there, dangling over our head like a spider thread, just enough to remind us of what had happened.

 _Great, I've only been awake for three hours, and I managed to piss off most of my inner circle (not that the number exceeds five anyway),_ I thought as I flopped my head back into the soft pillow pathetically. _Maybe my apologies need some work._

* * *

A/N: There we go, I've had my yearly dose of Shisui and I'm happy. Seriously, I need him in order to survive the exam week in January. Confession time (maybe I should make this a thing): so I named the character Maiko after one of my favourite Japanese singers, Nakamura Maiko, and I fell in love with that name. Some name in the running included Shion (after Miyawaki Shion), but I figured that would be confusing because many other characters are named Shion.

Anyway, this shall be the last update in 2016, and the next one will be on Jan. 7, Saturday.


	25. Chapter 25 - Promise

A/N: Not my best chapter since I was struggling to get it out, with the exams and studying and all that.

* * *

Chapter 25 - Promise

"Maiko-chan, do you remember what I said when I first agreed to put you in Anbu?" The Hokage asked me with a genuine smile, yet I couldn't relax under his watchful gaze. Just like what Kakashi had told me, three days after I woke up, the Hokage had summoned me and I was escorted to his office.

"You said that if I show any sign of mental instability, you would pull me out, even if it means forcing me to retire from the normal shinobi force," I answered in an emotionless voice, hoping that my nervousness wouldn't show.

"Not quite. I said if you show any sign that you are unsuitable for Anbu, I would pull you out. 'Unsuitable' counts for a lot more than just mental instability and physical injuries." The Hokage-sama kept his eyes on me. Sometimes, it was hard to believe that someone that benevolent could have such piercing power in his gaze, but I guess this was expected for the most powerful shinobi in Konoha.

"Can you tell me what happened during that mission. I want to hear your story, not just the events mentioned in the written report." The Hokage tilted his head a bit as he watched me attentively as if deciding whether I was a good resource or a liability. I didn't want to be a liability. Liabilities had no value, so they get disposed of.

"First of all, I had no choice but to engage Orochimaru in battle because he was threatening our survival. His snakes cut off any possible escape routes, so we had nowhere to run. I realised the wrong in my actions by excessively engaging him in battle when we had an opening to escape. I let my personal emotions run wild when he provoked me with my family history and my brothers. Thus, I accept any punishment you wish for me." I kept my voice detached so that my anger wouldn't show because just talking about that vile snake made me want to smash him to pieces. In the end, I kneeled and bowed my head in front of the Hokage.

"That's right, your actions there could have killed your teammate, and eventually killed yourself as well simply because of your unfamiliarity with the target. And that, that is unacceptable in the Konoha shinobi force." The Hokage-sama's cold and harsh voice rained down on me. The air in the room suddenly turned heavier, it pressed down on my body, threatening to crush me to the floor. I bit my lip and kept my composure. If we were talking about killing presence, I was not willing to let anyone push me down, not even the Hokage.

"However, I am not cultivating a force of cold-blooded killers. Every one of my shinobi has emotions, and I believe the love we have for others is what makes us strong." In an instant, the pressure in the air disappeared and I involuntarily let out a breath I'd been holding since forever.

"Orochimaru is dangerous on many levels, one of them is his ability to manipulate his opponent's emotions. You are not the first to lose, and you will not be the last. There's no point in reprimanding you of something that so many more seasoned shinobi have failed before you." I looked up to see Hokage-sama's benevolent smile. There must have been a glint of surprise in my eyes because he seemed very amused by my reactions.

"I don't know if this is much of a compliment, but you are not unsuitable for Anbu. All you lack right now is the time to adjust and gain more experiences in this line of work. I am not judging you on the same level as your captain, who has been in the force for more than a decade. However, let this be served as a warning for you, so that you may not act as recklessly next time."

"Your punishment will be two months of suspension from Anbu, and the official statement will be medical leave. In this period, you are not allowed to take any missions outside of the village or anything above a C-rank. Your captain suggested a suspension for four months, but I believe that your act of saving your teammate offers you some bonus points. After two months, your physical fitness and psyche will be tested for further decision. Do you agree with my arrangement?" The Hokage smiled.

"Yes, Hokage-sama! I mean, I don't have any objections to your arrangement. Thank you for your leniency." I dropped my head in embarrassment, but the Hokage just chuckled lightly at my flustered response. Two months of suspension? That was like the best I could ask for. No jail, no forced retirement… besides, I supposed that I did need some time to sort things out, whatever these things were. The only thing I should be concerned about was money, D and C-rank mission don't pay much, but at least I still sort of employed.

"Now that's settled, I would like to talk to you about the information regarding Uchiha Itachi." Just like that, the pressure in the room returned again and created that suffocating atmosphere.

"I am aware that he has now joined the international criminal organisation Akatsuki, although we have very little information on this said organisation other than some old mentionings of a rebellion in Amegakure. Is there anything else you would like to mention?" the Hokage asked me, careful with his words, as though he thought I would break if he mentioned _his_ name anymore.

"Orochimaru mentioned Itachi destroying one of his arms when he tried to take his body. If Itachi joined Akatsuki after the massacre, then it would be plausible to think that Orochimaru was also in the organisation, at least until the repercussion of his actions affected him," I analysed. This was my first plausible information about Itachi since the massacre, and as much as I needed it, all I felt was a sense of dread when I heard the news. It could be false, giving Orochimaru's reputation, the possibility of it being real was quite slim.

"That complicates things, doesn't it. I would like you to remain silent about this, no one should be told of this." He said with scrunched eyebrows, and I nodded. "Are there any other questions you would like to ask?"

I stayed silent for a moment, not sure if I should take the risk, because the question I was about to ask could get me into a lot of trouble, and I wasn't even in the clear for this one yet. Finally, I said it out loud, nervously clenching my hands into fists.

"Hokage-sama, if I may, have you ever send any missions to recapture or eliminate Itachi?" He seemed startled by my question, more so than he should. Yes, it was a question that potentially breached all safety protocols, but he should have expected it. He didn't say anything for a minute. Just as I thought he would shoo me away, he answered in his mellow voice.

"No, we have no information on his whereabouts before this event, and because of the decline in police force after the massacre, Konoha does not have the resources to do a carpet search of a missing-nin. However, after this incident, I imagine that we would start with an investigation of this criminal organisation. A group made up of S-rank missing-nins sounds very…disconcerting."

There was a pause, the suffocating tension lingering in the air before he swiftly continued.

"And no, you cannot be on the investigation. I know you want to hunt down your brother, but you are far too inexperienced to deal with S-rank missing-nins. It would not do any good for you to be emotionally afflicted and get yourself killed." The Hokage said sternly before I could say anything. I wasn't planning on asking anyway. Okay, maybe I might have thought about asking him. Just a tentative thought.

"Yes, Hokage-sama. There's also the matter with my younger brother. Orochimaru threatened him, and he needs protection." Since the way Hokage spoke signified the end of that conversation, I moved onto the next order of business. He looked like he was thinking deeply, with his concentrated expressions under the hat.

"I will increase the village patrol and the village barrier. Although there is nothing I can do to directly give him protection, I encourage you to bring him to the Nara compound more often. I will instruct Shikaku about it, since being in a clan compound is much safer than being alone. I'm so sorry, my girl, but that's all I can do at the moment." There was a hint of regret and sadness in his voice, but I brushed that aside. I was far too concerned with Sasuke's safety right now.

"Thank you, Hokage-sama, that will be plenty." I bowed again to show my respect. It definitely wasn't enough, but for now, I knew that I wouldn't be able to get any guarantee.

"Good. When you are discharged, hand in your report of the mission to the Intelligence Division. Include lots of details on your battle with Orochimaru, I believe he has gained some interesting abilities. Also, there will be curious people asking about your battle and how you survived it, but you are to say nothing about it unless it's me. You can just use 'classified on Hokage's order' to deal with them. I want you to keep a low profile, and take care of yourself, Maiko-chan, don't do anything rash again." I nodded again at Hokage-sama's kind voice and excused myself. Just before I could exit through the door, he called out to me again.

"Oh, I almost forget, I heard there are some complications with your eyesight. Here, you can swing by this address to ask for some help. He's quite stubborn, but you can tell him I sent you." Casually, he wrote something down the paper and gave it to me. I had to refrain from raising an eyebrow as I picked up the note.

"Congratulations, you survived your first S-rank mission, and I'd say you completed it quite well under those circumstances. However, due to your suspension, I regretfully inform you that you will not be able to receive your pay cut. Have a nice rest, Maiko-chan." He finished the last sentence with a smile. _Yes, the Hokage-sama does have a sense of humour, a very cold one._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I was discharged after a week. For some reason, the nurse kept me on painkillers for most of the time while I was in the hospital. Only a day before my discharge did they stop the supply of sedative, and that was when I understood that it was there to keep the healing process as painless as possible. So when I left the hospital room, I was a bit flimsy in addition to having most of my depth perception gone.

 _Bang!_ I walked straight into the door frame and let out a small yelp.

"Uchiha-san, are you okay? Do you want to stay for a checkup?" The nurse asked cautiously as I placed a hand on my forehead to ease the pain.

"No, I'm fine, thank you. Just a bit dizzy from the sedatives." I mumbled lightly as I pushed past her. I really, really wanted to get out of here.

"If you feel anything wrong, please come back for a checkup." The nurse called out as I stumbled out of the hospital. The first thing I did was to drop my report off at the Intelligence Division. I didn't get to see Shun, so I just left my report with Yamanaka Inoichi, who reminded me that I still had many psych evaluations with him, courtesy of my Captain.

Soon, after many stumbles and whispers of the most creative curses, I stood outside a grey apartment door, holding the piece of paper that the Hokage-sama gave me. The address pointed me to this apartment. It was close to the facilities at the village centre, but it didn't look very big from the outside structure, most likely a one bedroom apartment.

Hesitantly, I knocked the door lightly and waited curiously for any response. There was a minute of silence before the door creaked open slowly, revealing a bored Kakashi. He wasn't wearing his Anbu uniform, nor did he cover his sharingan with the hitai-ate.

"Um, good morning, Captain." Yeah, I had nothing better to say. The last time I saw him, he was quite angry at me.

He stared at me silently, as if debating whether or not he should slam the door in my face, which would have been a reasonable response, I supposed. He didn't say anything, instead, he tilted his head a bit and looked at me expectantly.

"So, the Hokage-sama send me here, since I need some help with my eye." I continued in a small voice. He continued to stare at me for a moment before letting out a sigh, then turned around and walked away, leaving me confused at his doorstep.

"What are you waiting for, a formal invitation?" Resisting the urge to roll my eyes at his sarcasm, I held my tongue. Slowly, like a cautious rabbit, I peered past the door left ajar and pushed it open a bit more. There was a slight creak as I stepped in. His apartment was clean but empty; there were only a couch and a table in the living room, and the wallpaper is a colour of greyish-blue. I didn't think there could be anyone else whose room was as bleak as mine, but his was close.

The funny thing about walking with one eye is that even if I could see the thing in front of me, the judgement of distance was always a challenge. It was kind of like walking in Suna's sand dunes. The fact that the sedatives were still making me tipsy was not helping my case. I raised my foot to step on the platform leading to the inner room and I miserably failed in judging the distance. My step wasn't big enough, so I stumbled and tripped disgracefully.

I did feel my head spin due to the sudden motion, but I never felt the impact of the cold, hard floor. When my head was clear again, Kakashi hauled me up by my waist and placed me firmly on the ground.

"Are you sure it's just your eye that's the problem, not your head as well?" His visible eye glinted in amusement and irritation. I couldn't see his expression under the mask, but I was sure it's full of mockery.

"Hush, I'm still dizzy from the sedatives, besides, it's just this one time." I defended in annoyance, dusting his hands away. Involuntarily, I placed my palm on my temple to ease the drowsiness. Maybe I should have waited a bit until the sedatives were out of the system, but this visual perception problem needed to go away as soon as possible.

"Sure, so it wasn't you who stumbled several times in front of the Intelligence Division?" Amused, he crossed his hands in front of his chest.

"How the hell do you know that?" I asked in disbelief.

"Accidental discoveries." That was all he answered as he walked away, so fast that it looked like a blur. I followed him into the living room; it certainly wasn't big, but it was quite spacious. Without any more words, he left the room while I stood awkwardly in front of the navy blue couch.

"Are you still angry at me? I apologise for my actions, it won't happen again." With nothing better to say, I asked the most important question on my mind, but immediately after I asked it, I regretted it deeply. _That was a dumb question, o_ _f course, he is still angry at me, I jeopardised the mission and Falcon's life with my impulsive actions. One thing Captain hates the most are those who don't care about their comrades._

"You are obviously not sorry enough, if it were up to me, you would have a six months suspension." I heard a grumble coming from the other side of the wall, along with the sound of drawers opening and closing.

"Really, Hokage-sama told me you only proposed a four months suspension." _Yeah, my attempt at making small, less awkward conversations sucks._ If there was one way to piss off a Captain, it was to remind them that their decisions got rejected by a higher-up.

"I was being nice, but now I see that you don't need it. I don't mind adding a report about your mental confusion. Looking at your performance today, I don't think anyone would disagree." To my relief, he didn't sound particularly angry. There was obvious irritation in his voice that could be heard from a mile away, but also along with a minuscule amount of mockery. Soon, he opened the door and returned to the living room. As I stood silently in the living room, he walked past my left and disappeared from my view.

Suddenly, I felt a rush of piercing wind coming from my left along with a sharp intuition telling me to dodge for survival. Immediately, I turned, whipping my head towards my left and grabbed the kunai out of the air. The kunai blade was dull and unpolished, so I was able to grab it within one inch from the front of my forehead.

"Your reflex is much worse than I expected. The fact that your sharingan is so powerful means that it makes you rely on it much more than your other senses. Now that your eyes are experiencing problems, you need to learn to use your other senses. Sharingan is a powerful tool, but it's not the answer to everything. The only reason that the kunai is not embedded in your forehead is because of your exceptional instincts." Kakashi stood a few meters away from me, eyeing me critically.

"So, if I didn't catch it, I would get a hole on my forehead?" I questioned as I expressed my discontent by throwing the kunai back at him.

"Hence the dull kunai. So no hole on your head, but a nasty bruise to knock you back to your senses." He twirled the kunai until it disappeared to somewhere and asked, "How's your condition?"

"Physically, I'm getting there. Mentally however, apparently, my therapy sessions just got upgraded to weekly updates, thanks to you." I said in a flat voice, not at all hiding my distaste for any kinds of psychotherapy.

"How does dying feel." At first, I was a bit surprised by his sudden question, but then, the reality hit me again. I died, I was dead. But then, I came back. It wasn't like that time when I reincarnated, no, not at all. This time, I had no second chance. This body, this life, this rhythm of heartbeat… they were all I had, and I was getting so close to losing it all. Again.

"Dying was painful. Being dead was … just sad. And coming back, it was just so miserably heartbreaking." I whispered after a long pause. I could tell by the strange look Kakashi was giving me that my answer didn't make much sense. But this was the first thing I felt when I tried to remember my experience. The rawest emotions there were that pushed me back to life. "Overall, it sucked," I added quickly, deciding that I could sort out all these craps later.

"Good, now that you know how unpleasant it is for you _and_ your teammates, don't do it again." I raised a brow against his warning, _how does he expect me to control it? It wasn't like that I asked to be impaled._ Still, I nodded.

"So, when do we start?" I asked in the midst of the awkward silence.

"Ten minutes, training ground 37. When you come back after the suspension, I don't want a useless liability on my team." Like a breeze of wind, he disappeared again. Despite what he said, I doubt he would reappear anytime sooner than three hours, considering that he was still mad. As I walked (without stumbling) towards the forest, I couldn't help but let out a small smile. Kakashi said "my team", so that probably meant he had more or less forgiven me, or at least he's less angry now that he was willing to put me back on his team again.

The wind was blowing my hair against my face and it was brushing over my eyes. The details were clear in my right eye, the texture of apartment walls; the splatter of tiny little ink droplets around the shop banners; the delicate petals of the newly bloomed flower of spring. No, it was not the details, but the world as a whole that was fuzzy and my sight was confined even more so now that the images seemed to cut off. It was fuzzy because I couldn't piece them together, and it was fuzzy because I couldn't see the direction where I was going far, far away. Ultimately, I couldn't perceive the world.

But for now, I knew I was walking towards training ground 37, where my captain would arrive late like usual, and then he would start the involuntary lessons of teaching me how _not_ to die.

And that, that was good enough for now.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I sat on a flat rock under one of the few shades that existed in training ground 17. Against the flow of soft winds, I turned a page of the old black book in my hand and read it quietly.

"You are supposed to be working as an assistant teacher right now, Maiko. So can you at least act like you are doing something?" I looked up from the page momentarily to see an unimpressed Akira-shishou staring at me with a raised eyebrow.

"But I am doing something. Besides, it's a volunteer duty which I got dragged in involuntarily." I said with an innocent smile. Although to be fair, I didn't come here for the pay. It was actually Shishou's offer for some extra kenjutsu lesson that convinced me.

"It's called gratitude, kids these days…what are you reading?" Akira-shishou suddenly asked as he eyed my book suspiciously; he probably thought I was picking up Kakashi's indecent habits. I wouldn't deny that being around someone for so long did have an effect on my behaviour, for example, my tolerance for vicious sarcasm.

"It's a bingo book, Shishou, not whatever you are thinking," I answered, flipping another page in the process.

"Bingo book? Haven't you memorised all of them already?" He asked, furrowing his eyebrows.

"I did memorise the ones from the major five villages, but this is the compilation from the minor shinobi villages, and it's not even current. I can only find the edition from two years ago." I told him the honest truth. After the discussion with Hokage-sama, I remembered him mentioning Akatsuki being related to some civil rebellion in Amegakure. So as a pastime, I had started some subtle research on Amegakure and their missing-nins.

"Hey Shishou, why aren't missing-nins from Amegakure in this book? Their village should be big enough to fit in this book, right?" I asked, flipping through the previous pages, but I couldn't find a single missing-nin from Amegakure.

"Amegakure? They have always been secretive before, and I think the censoring of information has become stricter in the past few years. I don't think you will find any information of their missing-nins in the official books, they stopped issuing their bingo list three years ago." Akira-shishou answered with a thoughtful expression, and I nodded slightly to his response.

"Then do you know about the civil insurgency back in the Third Shinobi War?" I asked again.

"Civil rebellion? I don't know much about that, but I believe it was around the end of the Third Shinobi War. There seemed to be some group in Ame that revolted against the Amegakure government, for what I don't know, but it had something to do with the war. It didn't last for long though. Ame's current leader, Hanzō the Salamander squashed them quickly." He said with uncertainty and I didn't blame him; information from other villages was always on a blockage.

"Hanzō the Salamander…," I mumbled, remembering all the information I had about him. S-rank, leader of Amegakure since the Second Shinobi War. Able to win against the Legendary Sannins. He didn't strike me as the merciful kind, so if Akatsuki really originated from the rebellion group, then it's quite unlikely that it was led by the same people. The first rule in a war was to destroy the enemy leaders and all those who had the potential to become one.

"Why don't you go search through the archives at the Intelligence Division? I don't know how much information they have, but it's definitely more than what I can offer you." Akira-shishou suggested and I groaned.

"Foreign shinobi information is hard to get, I had to do a bunch of errands for the Intelligence Division before they were even willing to let me borrow this book." Those pricks were all so stingy about letting out information as if I would leak them out to the enemy.

"Just ask Shun, you guys are friends. I'm sure if you asked … nicely, he would help you." I looked at my shishou unimpressed. I was pretty sure that he already knew about the tense and unhappy situation between Shun and I. Oh, we were still talking, it was just that we talked with silent anger pent up, and both of us were too stubborn to deal with this impasse.

"Seriously, you two are still fighting? I don't even know the reason for it. The two of you should be mature enough to solve this on your own. Maybe I overestimated your social skills… Just entertain me, what did you do? Refuse to pay the rent or something?" I sighed against Shishou's endless rent, but before I could return a single word, I noticed the group of three genins approaching us. As unfair as it might be, I really didn't want them to hear anything about me, especially not that boy from Grass who just randomly appeared here.

"Aren't the three of you going to take the Chunin exam in four months? If you don't practice, all of you will be wiping the floor with your faces." With a loud snap, I closed the bingo book as I warned the three genins dispassionately.

"Absolutely, you all need to be more prepared." Now that was a surprise for Shishou to agree with my snappy words, but then… "I should have told you about your Maiko-senpai's not-so-delightful experience in her Chunin exams. Due to the lack of preparation and training, she was almost flanked by puppets. And the worst of all, she almost lost to some random person with a sword and degraded my valuable kenjutsu lessons. So all of you should learn from her experience, isn't that right, Maiko?"

I glared at my shishou with disbelief. _That_ was an exaggeration, I did alright, albeit with a few embarrassing performances now that I thought about it, but nothing worth digging up my personal history for. I suddenly had a feeling that Shishou was using me as a negative teaching material, seeing that I wasn't contributing much to any other aspect of his teaching.

Anyway, I wanted to leave, but I realised that the genins still stood there with no sign of wanting to move. _Now, please don't tell me that they want an elaborate version of how disgusting and annoying puppets are._ Like a pair of flustered hamsters, Momo and Satoru hid behind Ryuu as Momo poked him lightly, urging him to do something.

"Senpai, we were wondering if you'd be willing to spar with us, so we could gauge our abilities for the upcoming chunin exam," Ryuu explained as Momo and Satoru peered over his shoulders. _Seriously, what's wrong with you people, I'm not that scary._

"That's a great idea, your Maiko-senpai was just talking about performing her duties as the assistant teacher today, weren't you, Maiko?" Before I could answer, Akira-shishou already decided a course of action for me. With a sigh, I put the old bingo book on the rock and strapped the twin swords on my waist by the holsters.

When we all positioned ourselves on the training ground with the three genins around me in a large circle, Akira-shishou yelled out our instructions, "Satoru, Momo, Ryuu, attack with all you've got, everything is allowed. Survive ten minutes against her, and you three win." Then he turned his attention to me, "Maiko, beat them in ten minutes, you can use your swords, but as soon as you leave the clearing, you lose." I nodded as he paused a bit, then continued, "Oh, Maiko, control your power, don't give them any permanent injuries. I still need them for the Chunin Exam." I nodded again, seeing how the bodies of the three genins tensed at Akira-shishou's nonchalant expression.

"Ready! Start!" With a loud yell, Akira-shishou disappeared from the training ground, leaving me surrounded by three nervous genins (or maybe it was just two, Ryuu seemed pretty calm). Akira-shishou's new genin team had an unusual composition, because while Momo and Ryuu were both training in kenjutsu, Satoru had decided to specialise in sabotage and trapping, thus he hid somewhere in the forest, supposedly out of sight. Momo was on my left, with a straight kodachi in her right hand. Her stance was standard and well trained, but I could see the uncertainty in her body. Ryuu, on the other hand, extended his katana on my right, his breathing calm, and his muscles tensed in concentration. Unlike Momo, his stance was still and confident and sharp. I could see why Akira-shishou was so fond of him; he had a natural affinity for kenjutsu because he wasn't afraid of sharp blades.

Ryuu was the first one to charge. He bolted like a bullet, swinging his katana in a smooth circle as he appeared in front of me. I caught his blade with my ninjatō before it could get anywhere near me, and then, Momo moved. She skidded lightly, thrusting her blade towards my chest as I was caught up by Ryuu. Momo's footwork was good, but her speed was too slow. I effortlessly turned my body and guided her kodachi straight towards her teammate. With a wide eye, Ryuu retracted his katana at the last moment to prevent it from impaling his teammate. I flickered five meters behind them, the tantō still sheathed at my waist as I waited for them to attack.

They looked at each other and nodded slightly before charging in again. I parried apart their attacks, twirling my ninjatō around playfully and occasionally slamming the flat of my blade into their bodies. Sometimes, Satoru would ambush me with shuriken or earth ninjutsu, but they were predictable and the damage was quite easy to avoid.

I deflected a few wind blades from Ryuu quite easily, but then Momo, with perfect timing, sent a few small fireballs to join the pathway of the wind blades. The wind nature increased the power of the fireballs, almost doubling their sizes. Immediately, I shot out three water pillars out of my right palm and willed them to move in a zigzag to extinguish the fireballs in its path. Momo's fireballs were solid, and their attack powers were decent, but she could only use them in a straight path for now. That meant after the water pillars destroyed the fireballs, the next target in line was the small kunoichi.

Ryuu grunted as I tilted his katana up and slammed the hilt of my sword into his ribs. I lowered my body as his movements halted for a second, sweeping my leg towards his in a small circle, and he was just fast enough to jump up to avoid being swept to the ground. He swung a half circle with his blade downwards, and I rearranged my body just a little bit to avoid the strike. Just to make a point, I grabbed his extended arm and slammed him into the ground. As his body hit the floor, he changed into a log. _Replacement technique in the nick of a time, not bad thinking,_ I praised silently.

"Three minutes left!" Somewhere in the forest, Akira-shishou yelled, signalling me that I should probably get serious. Suddenly, I felt a pulse underground, it was like someone was disturbing the earth down below. I knew this familiar feeling, it was a jutsu that allowed the user to hide and move under the earth for a surprise attack.

The moment the boy resurfaced under me, arms outstretched towards my ankles, I jumped up just high enough to avoid his reach. Lightly, I tapped the flat of my blade to his exposed neck and sent a jolt of electricity down. In the matter of a second, Satoru was paralysed and stuck in the earth with shocked eyes. _One down, two to go._

I found Momo next and she parried my swords away frantically. Her speed wasn't bad, and if anything, I'd say she was quite suitable for Akira-shishou's quick and fluid kenjutsu style. However, she had the same problem as I did a few years ago: her strength was severely lacking. Once she met an opponent with equal or faster speed, she was forced to fend herself with no time to make any hand seals for ninjutsu.

In a mere thirty seconds, I quickly dispatched her. After placing a strong hit to her leg, she faltered, then I smacked her kodachi away. Just like with Satoru, I symbolically tapped her neck with the sword flat and send some lightning chakra down her nerves.

I scanned the training ground for any signs of the last boy standing, and it wasn't long before a string of wind blades attacked me from behind. I waded through the sharp blades, deflecting them aside easily, and charged towards the black haired boy who raised his katana in an offensive position.

After a few exchanges of swords, I ducked under one of his swings and aimed for his legs. He was vigilant in trying to get away, but I had already smacked his right knee with the lightning chakra charged ninjatō. He resiliently stood his ground and blocked my blade aiming for his neck despite his paralysed right leg, but then I just hooked onto his shoulder and threw him over my head, slamming him into the cold hard ground, face down.

I was fully prepared to send a jolt of lightning chakra down his spine as I clutched onto his neck. Just then, my left arm went blank. It wasn't paralysed, no, I was very aware of the fact that my hand was strangling someone's neck. It was the chakra, it had stopped moving in my arm. Ever since I had come to this world, chakra had always been an integral system in my body, just like my circulatory vessels. The feeling when the flow of my chakra had stopped was…terrifying. It was like a part of me had just died, and given recent experience, that was not a good thing.

Immediately, I let go of him and jumped up, ceasing any physical contact with this unknown entity. However, before he could get up, I placed the blade on his neck, blade flat and pressed by his throat, tilted just a few degrees. At this point, the normal flow of chakra had returned to my left arm, yet I still stared warily at the boy as I emitted a cloud of killing intent.

"Time's up! Break apart everyone!" Akira-shishou arrived quickly beside me and Ryuu, and I dropped the killing intent and retracted my sword. Slowly, the boy got up from the ground and raised his hand to massage his neck. Now that he was up, I could see the light purple colour on his neck. Suddenly, I felt a little bit guilty for hurting him just because I freaked out. He was only a genin, and one of my Shishou's genin.

"We will debrief after the paralysis had worn off. Maiko, Ryuu, we are going to have a private chat." He eyed us without a smile and led us into the forest nearby.

"What the hell happened?" He didn't specify whom the question was addressed to, but by the glare he was sending me, I assumed that it was for me.

"I couldn't feel the flow of chakra in my left arm when it was in contact with him," I responded. For a second, Shishou was quiet, and I thought I found a tiny bit of guilt and embarrassment on his face.

"Yeah, that…I kind of forgot to tell you this, but Ryuu apparently had some sort of Kekkei Genkai. We don't know the specifics of it yet, but apparently, it has something to do with syncing chakra flow. He can slow down people's chakra flow if a part of their body is in physical contact with him. Technically, your flow of chakra didn't stop, it was just slowed to a level that resembled stillness." _What? A Kekkei Genkai that deals directly with chakra flow? Never heard of it. Then again, Ryuu is from Kusagakure, and his heritage is a mystery. But will Konoha really let an immigrant with a Kekkei Genkai run wild without figuring out their bloodline's ability?_ No, they wouldn't. So they either knew the specifics or even they couldn't figure it out. Some Kekkei Genkais were complex, like Sharingan. Unless those with it offered their information willingly, it was hard for others to gain a complete image.

"And you thought this was not important because...?" I stared at my shishou accusingly. I could have killed him in my stupidly twitchy state if the bruise around his neck was any indication.

"I didn't think you would freak out that much." I only raised my eyebrow at this answer. _Seriously? Who wouldn't freak out?_ _Call it occupational hazard or something, but when I find something unknown or life-threatening or both, I classify it as a threat before anything else._

"Ryuu, you are not supposed to use it in practice battle right now, you know that you have to slow down your own chakra flow to sync it and it puts too much strain on your body." Next, Akira-shishou turned to the boy who started this fiasco, who stood calmly, showing not even the tiniest hint of guilt.

"Sorry, Sensei. It just kicked in against survival." He didn't sound sorry at all. "Can I ask a question?" Shishou rubbed his temple and waved his hand for him to continue.

"Senpai, if there something wrong with your left eye? Your reaction time for attacks from the left side was just a fraction of a second slower than the right." He said it so calmly as Akira-shishou slowly turned his attention to me, eyes narrowed at my left pupil. _I really, really regret not killing - I mean, paralysing that kid._ But seriously, he learned fast. The best way to get Akira-shishou to stop being mad at you was to direct his attention to something that would make him even angrier.

"Ryuu, go back to your teammates, start on the team exercise once their paralysis fade. I'll be there shortly." He said to the genin as he fixed his piercing gaze on me. It had been so long since Shishou was angry at me, the last time being when I accidentally got myself stabbed out of a mishap when I was ten.

"How can you not tell me something so serious? This is about your health and you should have kept me informed, what if something dangerous happened in our training sessions?. How long do you suppose you can hide it?" Akira-shishou questioned me in a furious tone. After a moment of silence, I turned to face his gaze with my eyes open and determined. There was no point in hiding now, so I showed him my discoloured eye without any fear.

"It's only temporary shishou, the eyesight will return soon. There's nothing to worry about." I claimed against his disbelief.

"There's nothing to worry about? We all worry about you because we care about you. Did you hide it from everyone?" I bit my lips lightly at his accusation, but I didn't answer him. See, I didn't hide it per se, but I also didn't tell anyone. A part of me just wanted to forget about it, denying so hard that it ever happened. _Because admitting that I might lose my eyes forever is so scary._

"Stop being so aloof, Maiko. At some point, you have got to realise this, things you think only concerns you, doesn't actually only concern you. I assume that the reason why you and Shun argued has something to do with this attitude of yours." His tone suggested more than an assumption, more like a fact. A fact that I wasn't really willing to admit to.

"Fix things with Shun. It takes a lot to gain a true friend, through bond and through death. But it's awfully easy to lose one." That was the last thing I heard before I body flickered away.

 _The things I built through blood and tears, in hopes of gaining something, crumbled so easily in the end. I may not be all the reasons, but for so long, I had assumed that I was probably one of the reasons._

 _But maybe, just maybe, I can fix it. See, I made a lot of promises. I wouldn't consider myself a great person, but I am determined, and I don't intend to break my promises._

* * *

A/N: Confession time! To be fair, this is not a self-insert since my real personality is definitely not like Maiko. But if I were to be honest, just personality and habit wise, I would probably be closer to Shun (But it was a coincidence, I didn't even realise how much in common I have with him until my beta pointed out). Have a good day, people!


	26. Chapter 26 - Identities

A/N: so half of my exams are done, and another week to go ...

Beta'd by Alice J

Just realised that I updated on the wrong day... the exams are really messing with my head. Oh well, I'll just leave it here... The next update is still on Saturday though... Normally I would be at school on Friday, but I get a day off for the exams...

* * *

Chapter 26 - Identities

Every one of my teammates knew that I hated going to the Intelligence Division. It was not that I had anything against all the intels, no, I was actually a firm believer that "knowledge is gold". It was just that there were a few rooms in the Intelligence Division that held a different purpose than the rest. A small northern section in the division was dedicated for psych evaluations and therapy sessions, and I absolutely despised going there.

Kakashi knew that. Perhaps that was why he forced me to attend therapy sessions during the two months of my suspension. For what, I wasn't sure, something about identity crisis? So far, Inoichi-san had agreed with me that there was no progress whatsoever. Of course, my captain wasn't happy, considering this was my last session scheduled before my suspension was over.

"Uchiha-san, here for your appointment with Yamanaka-san, I believe?" The receptionist greeted me with a smile which I returned with a nod. Silently, I followed the routine and headed towards the northern quarters, and the receptionist didn't stop me for any security and clearance check like she would for any other visitors. Maybe it was because she had already seen me too many times here (not something to be proud of), or maybe it was because of my connection with Yamanaka Shun. I really didn't care.

Quietly, I stared at the clock in the waiting room, waiting impatiently for the hour hand to strike three. There was still seven minutes, so I proceeded to close my eyes and rest.

The sound of footsteps broke through the monotonous ticking of the clock. I didn't snap open my eyes like I usually would, instead, I opened them slowly because I was very familiar with this particular set of footsteps.

"Good afternoon, Maiko." Ever the gentleman, Shun greeted me despite everything.

"Good afternoon, Shun." I greeted back. There was a distance in our voices that had never appeared before, but I supposed this was what happened when friends fought.

He wanted to walk away, I could see it in his wavering steps. Stepping forwards, stepping backwards. It looked like he was debating between running away or confronting a battle, and I wasn't sure which was more flattering to me. So before he could escape, I decided to speak up first.

"I'm here for a therapy session with Inoichi-san. Can you…I mean, will you come with me?" What I said must have been really unlike me, because he looked at me with so much uncertainty that I was sure he was running a diagnostic of the likelihood of dissociative personality disorder in his head.

"It's your private session, I shouldn't intrude― " He didn't get to finish his sentence because I stood up and cut him off.

"Shun. I'm really trying here. Akira-shishou told me to fix things with you, so I'm trying to do something. For once, I am not running away. For once, I am trying to show you my perspective. Just take it like my friend!" I had so much frustration in my voice, I had stunned him speechless. Under the awkward silence, I mumbled, "Inoichi-san wouldn't mind, you are his apprentice and my close friend. Apparently, there is this confidante program for emotional support that I never used, and probably never will."

Before he could respond, the door to the therapy room was flung open, revealing a blonde man with the same pale blue eyes as Shun.

"Maiko-chan, you may come in." He addressed me with a smile, before turning his attention to Shun, "Shun, I assume you are coming in as well, the lady herself requested so." With a bit of embarrassment, Shun nodded and followed me into the room with really comfy couches.

"So, where did we end off last time?" Inoichi-san said kindly, but considering how little progress I'd made over the past few sessions, the only thing that was keeping him from slamming the door in my face was probably professionalism.

"Identities," I answered, situating myself on the comfy couches - the only things that seemed worthy of my attention in this room.

"Exactly, so let's start with your Anbu identity, Rabbit. How do you feel about this?" Now, normally, I would answer that I was neutral about it, it was part of the job, so I didn't reject it. However, that was not the point here, was it? After a quick side view glance towards Shun, I spoke up.

"I like it. I mean, I like being Rabbit." There was a glint in Inoichi's eyes as he quickly jogged something down on his clipboard. _Woah, okay, that's not good._

"How so? Can you expand on why you feel this way?"

"It's easy. Rabbit is the identity I have when I take missions. I know that the missions are hard with assassinations, infiltrations, raids and that they will most likely get me injured or even killed someday. But being Rabbit is just so easy, she is a blank slate. Not in the literal sense, but all she needs to care about are the missions; there's no heritage, no history, no dreams behind her. It's just so easy to believe that I can live that cleanly." The words just flowed out like a river and before I knew what I said, it was already a flood.

"What about Uchiha Maiko, do you like that identity?"

"No. It's painful, very painful to be reminded of that." I paused a bit before I continued, "It's hard, and I have a lot of responsibilities. The Uchiha family name bears a lot of history. Every time I think of my name, I am reminded of the massacre, my parents' deaths, my cousin's death, and my brother's betrayal. There are so many responsibilities that I just want to run away from them." Surprisingly, I was quite calm. It was like a narrative speech, where I was just describing the feelings in an objective manner, no matter how absurd that sounded. Maybe I had always known of this issue, but I just thought it didn't matter. It was my job anyways to take on the responsibilities because I had already escaped them once years ago.

Ah, yes, this was the silence I've been waiting for. There was a show of sympathy in my psychiatrist's eyes, and Shun, well, I tried not to look at him. Inoichi-san was furiously scribbling something down in his notebook, and he raised his head, ready to continue his questions. However, I spoke up before he could say anything; considering that I was already one of his least favourite patients, I might as well keep that up.

"Oh, if you are going to write that down as mental instability or something like that, please don't, I'm not finished yet." With a sigh, Inoichi-san waved his hand, indicating for me to continue.

"I am not going to give up my identity as Uchiha Maiko, under any circumstances, if that's what you are worrying about. Yes, it's painful, but it's also the most precious thing I have. If I had not been Uchiha Maiko, I would have never met my family, my brothers, my cousin, my friends. The fact those memories hurt shows that I care, and that's more than what I can ask for. Being Uchiha Maiko is the best thing that has happened to me, and I am going to treasure it, not throw it away." Unconsciously, I placed my hands on my chest. I could feel it, my heart was beating, so strong and powerful. The strength of life.

' _I don't care about your name, I don't care about your status in the Uchiha Clan. You can be Maiko, or you can be Rabbit, or you can be someone else, I don't care. You will always be Hime to me, you will always be precious to me, so don't you ever forget that.'_

 _So it's okay if I decide to live as Uchiha Maiko, right, Shisui? In this life, I want to be somebody, not just a codename._ It was a promise made by my heart, and I would never forget it. I gave my therapist a genuine smile, one that showed him I really meant what I said.

"That was actually... better than what I expected. And here I was, expecting some year-long therapeutic plan from your recent performance." Inoichi-san returned the smile, his posture seemed more relaxed and he had put his pen down.

"Really? Was I really that troublesome?" I joked. _Yeah, there's no way that I'm going to attend some year-long help circles. Maybe I do make good decisions once in awhile._

"I don't know, you tell me. These reports on your _multiple_ hospitalisations because of busy A-rank missions don't really seem to be in your favour." He lifted a stack of files onto his desk and I sighed with exasperation.

"Since we are on a streak here, I might as well keep it going. I do kind of want to immerse myself in missions. To me, they are almost like an escape. But that's before I had a…realization with my most recent experience with death, and that's only a part of the reason." I had no idea what to call my little after-death meeting with Shisui. Realization? Enlightenment? Awakening? With a small nod, Inoichi signalled for me to continue.

"Well, first of all, I need money. Long story short, Sasuke is loaded with money he can't use and I am poor. I don't know what kind of inflation is going on around here, but the price for metal weapons these days are not cheap. Secondly, it's just that I died…" _Again._ I caught myself before I could complete the sentence that was rolling off of my tongue. I looked up again, seeing Inoichi-san's intrigued expression that urged me to keep going.

"You don't have to push yourself if you don't want to remember the experience. But if you are willing, please continue," He said to me in a comforting voice. But you see, I didn't stop because of the horrible experience (although it was really horrible), I stopped because I was connecting this event to the last time I had been blown to pieces - that decisive moment fourteen years ago. One slip up, and it's off to interrogation room we go. _Oh, what the hell, I won't get another chance to talk about resurrection so calmly, it was not like he knows what I'm talking about._

"Every time I had a … near-death experience, something would definitely change when I come back to the reality. I was just thrown into this without any say it in. It was like you go to sleep, really like the sleep, but then when you wake up, everything around you shifted in ways you are not prepared for. For that, I am lost, utterly lost. The changes, they made me feel like I'm detached from the reality, cut off between the pre-death and the post-death, unable to define myself again. Every time it happened, it's impossible for me to go back because a piece of me was already being chipped off. So I find comfort in Rabbit, knowing that 'she' is the one part of my identity that won't change." I mumbled softly, furrowing my body deeper into the comfy couches in the process. _Why am I telling him that?_ That thought went through my head multiple times, but they couldn't stop the words flooding out.

"Maiko, have you ever thought of the possibilities that these changes might be good for you. It may not be apparent, but with changes, it comes opportunities," Inoichi-san asked. For once, he had stopped scribbling things down onto his clipboard.

"I suppose." I definitely did not want to go back to my old life in OLYMPUS. Compared that organisation, my life here was a blessing. Maybe it had more to do with the fact that my past was just dangling there like a cloud of mysterious foreign stardust that wouldn't go away. I didn't know what to do with it. Accept it? Reject it? Forget about it?

"It's not a sin to seek stability. We are all scared of changes, but sometimes, they are definitely good for us. We live in a continuation, Maiko, and while we may think things are not changing, they are, constantly. To me, I'd hate to say this, but you are adapting fine. Even though I don't like your method, it works so far. But maybe it's time to realise that adaptation being your own choice, instead of the by-product of the environment. Once you get a sense of control in your life, you will feel a lot better and less afraid of the changes. Although Anbu requires you to have a certain malleability, life would be very bleak if all we do is adapting for survival. I tell this to the most diligent Anbu agent, Anbu uses the code name system for a very important reason: it's only one aspect of their lives, never the whole."

I stared at Inoichi-san as he finished his confusing speech. I didn't understand all of it, not really, but I supposed that his words did have some merits.

"That sounded like a pre-choreographed speech that you're just waiting to use on me." I chirped with a smile, and all I got was a snort.

"You have no idea. Oh, trust me, you make my life really hard with that attitude of denial, but you are not the only one going through this. The identity struggle, the emotional suppression … I am considering calling this collective entity the Anbu Syndrome. It's a phase, a very common one. Realisation alone doesn't make it alright all of a sudden, but it's good enough for most to know what cause the root of their problem and attempt to fix it, instead of pushing it away and bellow in confusion." Oops, that did sound like me.

"As for your identity issue, it's quite common for Anbu agents. Think of your life as a pendulum, one side it's the Anbu duty and the other side is your life as Uchiha Maiko. It's all about the balance. To me, it seems that your Anbu side is easy and well developed, therefore it's your comfort zone. However, your normal life can still be explored greatly. Personal growth is one area to explore, and that not only includes physical abilities, but also personal interests or ideologies. Right now, why don't we start with something small, personal interest, perhaps a hobby of some sort?"

"Hobby, that's the best you can give me. Seriously?" I was definitely not very impressed with the direction of this conversation. However, my therapist just gave me a look that said 'you are not giving me much to work with'.

It was then the sudden realisation hit: I have no hobbies other than in the name of survival. None. Perhaps this was the reason why I was so malleable. I could take on any role, any identity because I had none in the first place. It was so ironic that even though I abhorred the notion of being made into a mindless puppet following someone else's commands, I never thought of reaching out on my own. I was afraid of stepping out of my comfort zone. I was afraid of losing the anonymity I never had.

"We can always talk about morality and philosophical ideologies if you want, but I don't think that you want to spend another three hours with me. Besides, I'm not the solution. I listen to you, I evaluate you, and then I give you advice. It's up to you to take actions. Like I said, adapt according to your own choices."

"It doesn't have to be now. The fact that you are willing to make that step is progress. Your session is over, Maiko-chan, and I'm glad that we at least made some progress. Maybe it's Shun's effect. Hey, Shun, you should come more often, makes your shishou's job a lot easier." With a joking tone, Inoichi-san opened the door to the waiting room which signalled the end of my therapy session. Shun gave his shishou an indifferent face, looking unmoved by his teasing. I chuckled lightly, maybe this was a shishou-apprentice thing. For some reason, after we left their tutelage, they always find ways to tease us relentlessly. We were irritated by it to no ends, no matter how grateful we were of their teachings.

"Maiko-chan, I'll see you at your next scheduled Anbu psych evaluation, I hope you find something by then." With a smile, he shooed us out and closed the door. _Did he just…gave me a pass?_ Finally, I didn't have to come back for extra therapy sessions anymore. _This is a good day so far._

With a light heart, I walked out of the Intelligence Division. Then, I realised I forgot one person: the friend I was supposed to apologise to. Immediately, I turned around, almost crashing into the person standing just a feet behind me.

"You totally forgot about me, didn't you." I raised my head to meet Shun's accusing glare. There were irritation and playfulness in his voice, so I guess he wasn't that angry with me anymore?

"No, I knew you were behind me," I said quickly, there was no way he would let me live this down if I admit it now. He raised his eyebrow slightly, with disbelief written all over his face.

"So…when is your next psych evaluation?" Shun asked, probably having nothing better to say.

"In a month," I paused a bit, "if I don't get into any big trouble before that."

"So we have a month to get you a hobby. This is hard, you are a training maniac, you do nothing but train." I really wanted to smack that fake seriousness off his face, "Let's see, cooking, reading, gardening, drawing, stargazing?"

"No, no, no, no and what the hell is stargazing? Stop listing off any generic thing on the list, I'll … contribute to personal growth or whatever that is when I feel like it." I turned around and started walking. He followed me.

"For the record, I probably shouldn't have criticised you without knowing your side of the story, and I'm sorry for yelling at you." I heard him mumbling quietly behind me. The air between us had returned to normal, there was no longer awkwardness or anger permeating the space between us. With that, I smiled.

"Maybe you should thank Akira-shishou for suggesting the solution to me, by, oh I don't know, taking his requests to be a teaching assistant. His genins are loads of fun." Without turning around, I commented offhandedly. Immediately, I heard a laugh behind me.

"Yeah, nice try. Watching the four of you is like watching a train wreck happen in slow motion, can't say it's not entertaining. Whatever you did to them, Satoru is very scared of you; Momo idolises you like you're the coolest person in the world; Ryuu, well, he pisses you off and he knows it." _Very true_ , I thought. "I dread the day when you have to teach someone, truly, my condolences to them." _Yeah, me too, so hopefully, I never have to._

"Where are you going now?" Shun asked as he walked faster to catch up to me. I thought about it for a second before answering.

"I have a training session that was supposed to start half an hour ago, although to be fair, I don't think he will be there for another half an hour, but I better get going." Quickly, I touched my left eye, wondering if it would ever return. It had to return, I had to believe in it.

"What did I say earlier?" He teased with a laugh and I gave him a glare.

"See you later." He said.

"See you," I replied.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I couldn't see a thing, but that was supposed to be the point. When I heard the steps charging towards me, I immediately lowered my body and slid for a distance on the ground. I felt two strokes of wind jumping over me, one of them brushed me lightly with its slightly prickly furs. _That's Urushi,_ I deduced, _then the other one with the heavy footsteps must be Bull._

Suddenly, I felt a heavy presence looming over me, pressuring me from above. Without a second of delay, I jumped away and landed on the tree trunk on my left. Just as I bounced off of the tree, I heard the loud thuds of two forces crashing down. _Both medium-weighted, a bit on the heavier side, Ūhei and Shiba._

There were now four sets of sound behind me, catching up to me without any hesitation, so I ran faster. _Wait a second, there are only three now. The other one…Ūhei…he sprinted towards to the left then…_ 'thud', something landed right in front of me.

I didn't even have the time to curse as I did an unprepared front flip and almost landed on my knees. However, before I could regain my balance, something attacked me from behind. Something small crashed into me, it had the fresh smell of pine cones, _Guruko, he likes to roll in pine needles_. Without thinking, I body flickered, and it was only after I'd done it that I realised how stupid I was. Body flicker with no line of sight, not recommended.

I stopped somewhere between five to ten meters ahead of the pack, the large scrape on my arm showing me how lucky I was and how stupid my action was. Nevertheless, I kept running. I had five on my radar and three more to go.

Kakashi developed this exercise of running through the forest while avoiding his ninkens, blind. He was crazy, and I was probably also crazy for agreeing to it.

It was by sheer luck that I avoided Bisuke and Akino. I twisted my body at the last second and avoided an attack from Bisuke, and the only signal was the little fleck of dirt I felt when he jumped. Akino somersaulted me from the side, but when I landed on the side of a tree, he crashed into the tree trunk and I almost fell. I almost, but I didn't. I was just barely fast enough to grab onto a branch to swing myself forward. Once I had landed firmly on the ground again, I continued to run like hell.

 _One, two, three, four, five, six, seven… there's one missing. Pakkun._ I loved Pakkun, he was adorable, but the fact that he was so small made his presence completely hidden. I could feel it, the exit at the other end of the forest, and the gentle wind slowly became harsher, brushing against the fabric covering my eyes.

I was close, I swear I was close. Compared to the first day where I barely made even ten meters, this was an improvement. But not good enough. If I had to fight with one eye closed, so be it, and I better be damn good at it to stay alive.

A sense of danger surrounded me as I felt the heat of sunlight approaching. Then it all went wrong. Pakkun tripped me, and despite my attempt to jump up, he clung onto my ankle and dragged me down. I wasn't about to give up, no, so with a quickly flip, I flung the little pug off. However, the problem with the pack was that once one of them got me down, the rest would suddenly seem to appear out of nowhere.

As I rolled out of the forest, the dogs latched onto me one by one, dragging me back to the densely packed trees. With a final bout of strength, I jumped across the supposed finish line and fell into the clearing with four or five dogs in tow.

The crash knocked the wind out of me. As I rolled over on the ground and breathed desperately for air, the dogs released my clothes one by one. I was content to just lay there forever, but unfortunately, I heard a set of relaxed footsteps walking towards me. It was human. My freaking examiner was here.

"So close, but you lost at the last moment." Kakashi's casual voice sounded in front of me. I heard the rustling sound of a page flipping, he was definitely still reading that 18+ novel.

"I did get out, didn't I?" I argued, not even bothered to try to get up from the ground. However, I did sit up slowly, so that I wouldn't look so pathetic every time the training sessions ended.

"Only barely. If these were not of my pack, but enemies with swords, you would already have several gaping holes in you." There was a snap, hinting that he had closed his book. I could feel the intense gaze criticising me of my inability to survive, and he would be correct.

"Give her a break, Kakashi, the little pup is doing better than I expected. Remember your training? It took you three months to get this far." I heard Pakkun's encouraging voice and I extended my arms to allow him to jump on. With a small 'thud', I felt a furry mass in my arms.

I could hear Kakashi's mumbling of "traitor" and the other ninkens' snicker around us. It took a while before things settled down and he said to me, "You can take off the cloth now, we are done for today."

Without any hesitation, I snatched the fabric and pulled it off of me. I shook my head lightly to get my hair out of the way, then opened my eyes to welcome the visual sensory signals that immediately assaulted my brain. I saw the eight ninkens sitting around us, chatting happily with each other, wagging their tails in excitement. I saw Kakashi's blurry image in the corner of my left eye, leaving the vicinity from an angle I couldn't see, like usual.

 _Wait, what… I saw him in my left eye…_ Immediately, without thinking, I closed my right eye. This time, it was not the eternal darkness that greeted me, no, I could still saw the ninkens, the densely packed forest, the small river flowing beside us, and Kakashi, who stopped running away at my apparent strange behaviour.

With light steps, I body flickered to the river, stepping into the refreshing stream of water with no care of the world. I stared down at the crystal clear stream, and my face stared back at me, filthy and sweaty, but that was not the point. I blinked once, feeling the mangekyou sharingan activate smoothly. I saw it, the single crimson petal outlined in black that had reappeared in my left eye. Despite the asymmetricity of the image, I laughed with joy.

"It's back, finally back," I muttered in between bouts of broken laughter. Feeling the curious gazes on my back, I whipped my head around and flaunted my newly returned mangekyou sharingan. Kakashi's visible eye widened a bit in surprise, and there were a few excited barks from the pack.

"My left eyesight is back," I repeated, this time clearer and louder, but still with that stupid smile on my face. I wanted to say it again and again, as if to confirm the truth, to inscribe this moment into history, so that it would never be lost. _My sight is back. Today is a good day._

I didn't get to stand for long, because all the ninkens crashed into me in celebration, with Pakkun as the lead. I fell backwards into the river due to the impact, splashing the water up and drowning myself in the cold iciness. But it was not cold at all, it was refreshing.

Eventually, I got out of the river, with eight ninkens in toll, completely drenched in water. My captain was looking at us, mildly irritated by our childish behaviour. I couldn't blame him, I didn't know what had come over me, but it felt like I was in a drunken flurry today.

"Congratulations, I suppose you don't need to train with me anymore. What a shame, your training was going well, too." Kakashi said in a flat voice, staying as far away from the wet ninkens as possible, because they were shaking their bodies to dry up, spraying water everywhere around them. Meanwhile, I didn't even bother to move. I was already wet enough, a few more droplets of water was not going to hurt. So I stood between the ninkens, enduring the mini-rainstorm they brought.

"Nobody said that, so stop acting like you are off the hook. Who knows, maybe I still need the training in the future…not that I am planning on blinding myself again, at least not intentionally." I added the last sentence as soon as I felt the critical glare on me. It would be fun, wouldn't it, to be able to glare at people with two eyes again.

"Then you need to hurry up, there are only a few days left before your medical leave expires." I heard him saying as I wiped the water off of my eyes.

"Have I ever disappointed you before, Captain?" I was saying that as a joke, but when I saw Kakashi narrowing his eyes in skepticism, I scowled at him, "Don't. Just don't answer that." Kakashi nodded slowly.

"Boys, I think your master needs a bath, don't you?" I whispered to the ninkens around me. Pakkun's jaw widened in amusement as the other dogs nodded mischievously. Kakashi's ninken pack might be loyal to him to the point of death, but they were not above harmless pranks (bad influence on my part). Immediately, Kakashi shut his precious book and slid it down his jacket; when facing eight wet ninkens, the most dangerous threat was getting his book wet.

Soon the clearing was filled with blurs of human and dogs alike. The heno-heno-moheji squad chased their owner around the training ground, flinging water and dirt into the air. I stood in the middle of the clearing, gazing into the sky, taking in the vast blueness. _My sight is back, and I feel…whole again._

 _Today is a good day._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

When I got back to the apartment after a long, boring guard shift, it was already dark outside. The previous guard didn't even bat an eyelash when he saw me reporting for my shift, drenched in water. I supposed that when you guard the village gate often enough, you see enough strange things on a daily basis. Still, I stuck through my paid mission and by the time my shift was over, my clothes had already dried off.

I opened the door to my apartment and walked into the dark, empty room. Sasuke was at a sleepover with Nara Shikamaru. For some strange reason, the Jonin Commander didn't kick Sasuke out for electrocuting his koi pond, although there really had been no koi fish in it.

The first thing I did was to take a shower. As the hot steam filled the bathroom, I cleaned my body, scrubbing away the dirt and the sweat. When I stepped out of the shower, I glanced at the mirror. Despite the steam that clouded the mirror to a heavy opaque white, I could still clearly see the various scars that adorned my body.

The long laceration mark on my right thigh from when I was seven; the piercing scar on my stomach from when I was twelve; the healing scar on my chest from just two months ago, along with numerous smaller, paler white lines representing the dozens of battles I'd been through. Oh, how horrified mom would be if she could see me now.

They were not pretty, nor did they represent any honour or glory. But, they were a part of me. They represent those I saved, those I killed and those I lost. Suddenly, I remembered the thought I had years ago, about how my body would turn out to be exactly like the one I had in my previous life: trained and scarred. Ironically, it seemed to be very true, the parallelism was uncanny.

Even so, I recognised the clear distinction: I am Uchiha Maiko right now, and all those battle scars I had, were decided by me. I have an identity.

Suddenly, something clicked in my mind. I put on my clothes quickly and ran into my/Sasuke's room without even waiting for my hair to dry. I stumbled past the door and searched through the drawers. Sasuke liked to keep everything clean and organised, so I quickly found the drawer where I kept my extra things. After some searching, I found the little bag I was looking for and I pulled out the artifact I almost forgotten.

The black fabric was still comfortable to the touch, and the greyish-white pearl was still giving a smooth pearlescent shine that resembled the moonlight instead of the sun. Staring at the necklace, I smiled a bit. _Thank you Shisui, maybe all I needed was some confirmation, for someone to tell me that I wasn't crazy, that my search for truth wasn't worthless._

 _Thank you. Thank you for everything._

I put it back into the bag and placed it in the drawer, right where I found it. This time, I wasn't trying to suppress the bad memories. No, I was trying to keep the memento safe, until one day I could put it on with pride.

My fingertips brushed over the new scar I recently gained on my chest, and then I had the most random thought: _it's kind of ugly because Orochimaru was the one who caused it_. It was not huge, being only the width of a ninjatō, but the discolouration made it especially obvious. No doubt, there was the same scar on my back where the sword entered.

It was so glaring that I wanted to cover up the humiliating mark. Well, I could always find some ink and write 'Die Orochimaru' as a declaration for my aspiration, but that seemed very counter-intuitive and ironic, not to mention rubbing the salt on the wound.

No wonder people called me crazy.

Next, my sight hovered over the messy desktop covered with notebooks in various directions. "Come on, Sasuke. If you want to take my room, at least clean the desk." I muttered as I gathered the books and started to stack them properly.

I reached out for a forgotten notebook that obviously fell off the shelf when Sasuke pulled out some other books, but I accidently pushed it over the ledge instead. The notebook fell on the floor with its pages splattered open, revealing a few scribbles images.

Pencil drawing of a night-blooming cereus, all of them. Some scribbles out and some traced over with harsh pencil lines almost ripping the pages apart. _Ah, now I remember, the dark period of my not so bright past._

I remembered the obsession I had with that image right after the massacre, trying so hard to remember what it meant and how did I know it as if it could give me some answers as to why I was here.

That was the first time I realised that my old memory might not be as accessible as I thought. Clearly, dying the first time robbed me a bit more than just a world I was familiar with. All I could say was that all these impressions, memories I had of OLYMPUS, they were just scratching the surface like some primal instinct that allowed me to remember my disgust towards them and my fear towards being controlled. But they were far from the complete picture. Some episodic memories, they returned hastily, bits and pieces only in times when I didn't want them. But the ones I really wanted to know, it was like someone carved out an area of my brain left it empty.

I wanted to know why was I killed. I really did. I was an emotionless model for the organisation, so I couldn't figure out what I did wrong. After all, what was the biggest mystery in life? Death.

So all I could do at that time was to try to recreate that image which I knew had something to do with my first death; desperately attempting to find some kind of answer, even if I was asking the wrong question.

After two years, I found myself revisiting the question, probably at the worst time ever. Still, I stared at the image of something so beautiful, so out of place with my previous life and wondered. Why did I die?

" _..._ _Remember that you are nothing more than a tool that was built and designed to serve OLYMPUS…"_

" _... I said, kill me…"_

" _... Sophia Crowford …"_

" _... Some call it the 'Queen of the Night' … doesn't have the vanity a queen would hold…"_

" _... you know the rules …"_

Safe to say, it didn't take very long for the trance to break. When the voices all disappeared, I found my Sharingan already in full activation without me ever realising it.

I shook my head, clearing the whispers and the Sharingan alike. Quickly, I picked up the notebook from the floor and slipped it back onto the shelf, like all of this never happened. It shouldn't be happening, especially not now, when I was finally comfortable in my new skin; my new and precious identity.

 _Ah, I am accepting my new role, right? But how can I do that when I couldn't even let go of the past?_

After all, I wanted to be able to gamble everything on 'Uchiha Maiko'; leaving absolutely nothing behind with everything to lose.

* * *

A/N: I am almost done with Arc two, just a few more chapters. Confession time: I'm surprised that no one had complained about my section dividers (づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~. Let's just that I started the emoticon as a joke, and then my beta added the words. They looked better in my doc since they were in a different font ... now they just lose their fluffiness.


	27. Chapter 27 - Metalizing

A/N: So the exams are done, which is nice. This is the starts of a mini-arc that spans maybe three chapters and will wrap up Arc 2.

Beta'd by the mighty Alice J

* * *

Chapter 27 - Metalizing

[Noun: the general name for the technique of coating metal on the surface of objects.]

"This was not how I expected my first mission back to be," I mumbled as I looked towards the empty ocean. We were currently on a ship, in the middle of the sea, sailing to basically the north pole of this world.

"Me neither, but unfortunately, sometimes we get stuck with things we don't want." As usual, Kakashi felt the need to make a completely unnecessary remark without even glancing away from his book, and I had to resist the urge to roll my eyes.

"Thanks a lot, that did not hurt _at all_. I just meant that I thought Hokage-sama would send me on some, I don't know, smaller missions that are closer to home, considering all that 'emotional instability' you claim I have." I said flatly as I turned around, eyeing my captain accusingly. Okay, maybe his claims weren't wrong, but it didn't make me feel any less annoyed.

"In case you have been out of the job for too long, this _is_ a smaller mission. Minimal chance of fighting enemies, mostly just investigation and diplomatic stuff. Like the Chunin exam escort mission, just with no escorting involved."

"Yeah, and we all know how that went," I muttered, turning my face back to the view of the ocean again. My mind thought back to the moment when the Hokage-sama assigned our mission. I had been expecting some elimination mission, like the ones I usually took, since our team was built for combat after all. Instead, I got…

' _I'm sending you to the Land of Snow. The Land of Snow is known for its cold and harsh climate, however, its metal mining was responsible for a huge portion of Konoha's weaponry. Recently, the Snow Daimyo is refusing to do trades in regard to the metal mines with foreign shinobi villages, and it is causing a metal supply shortage for metal crafting. Objective one: to negotiate a trades agreement in a diplomatic manner. If objective one were to fail, then you are to investigate the reason why they refuse the trade. You are authorised to defend yourself if attacked in foreign lands, but your main mission is to bring information back."_

Yes, the Hokage-sama said it so nonchalantly, as if I had any experiences with that. Although it did explain why the metal price kept inflating recently, the law of supply and demand. Still, I had been assigned along with Kakashi, who probably also had the job of keeping an eye on me so I wouldn't do something stupid like last time. Courtesy of the Hokage-sama.

"Why me? I have no diplomatic experience, nor do I have any in-depth knowledge about trading clauses. So, why me?" I asked, and for the first time, Kakashi raised his one eye from the book and looked at me.

"It's your name. Uchiha is such a prominent clan in the village that just your last name gives you enough status to represent Konoha. Besides, you are the only Clan Head in the village with … a low profile, and thus you can also do the investigation part of the mission." Kakashi explained in a serious tone as he pulled out a file from the storage seal.

I narrowed my eyes just a bit the slight pause in his words. _A low profile, that's a nice way of putting it._ I was pretty sure that the Council threw me out for this mission because being received by a lesser diplomat would make the Snow Daimyo learn his place. In other words - the words that Kakashi was too nice to say - I was the demeaning object of the lower status to humiliate the Daimyo of a lesser country.

"You don't have to worry about the trade clause, Jonin Commander Nara wrote me a detailed report on what _not_ to accept. As for the political aspect of the mission, I believe the Hokage-sama wants you to get an early chance to practice." He glanced over at mission briefing, his eye darting from page to page. After hearing his explanation, I couldn't help but let out a sigh.

"There are only two people in the clan, and I'm not even a real Clan Head. The title automatically went to the oldest and I'm just a placeholder until Sasuke is old enough to take the title." I complained. I only took the temporary title so that I could gain Sasuke's guardianship. Now that I thought about it, my father never actually filed the official document for exilement, and I never demanded it. It was mostly a mutual understanding that I was a disgrace to the family. We sort of just let it hang there indefinitely, both too stubborn to take a step back.

"Not anymore. You are the prestigious Uchiha Clan Head for this mission, so at least pretend to be one." Under his serious gaze, I was unwilling to answer. Unconsciously, I glanced down at the Uchiha fan insignia sewn on my jacket, right over my heart, and I knew that there was a bigger fan crest on my back. Sasuke had been ecstatic that I put on the jacket for this mission, so much that he only complained for five minutes about my long absence. However, I couldn't understand the need to flaunt my identity so blatantly out in the open, it was like putting a permanent target on my back.

"Fine. What am I supposed to do?" I finally asked when the silence went on for too long. I didn't really have a choice, did I?

"Can't help you with that, I have no experience whatsoever; the Hatake stopped being a clan two generations ago. There was no detailed report from Commander Nara about 'how to act like a Clan Head'. However, Sandaime-sama did leave you a note." The ambiguous smile he gave me as he handed me a folded note made me wonder if he was joking or not, but like always, his mask prevented me from reading his expression. Nevertheless, I took the note and read it.

' _Don't worry about it too much, just go with your instincts and follow your gut._

 _\- Sandaime Hokage'_

"What the hell is this …" I was going to say 'half-assed', but then I remembered that this was the Hokage's note "... vague note from our esteemed Hokage-sama."

"Your only advice. So ponder over it for the next three days before we arrive at our destination. You don't want a failed B-rank mission on your record now, do you?" The moment he collected the note from me, he stuffed everything right back into the storage scroll. He was right, I didn't want a failed record on my mission. Despite all the 'extra records' that happened on my missions, I managed to complete every one of them, and I don't plan to fail now of all times.

While we were talking, the sky darkened as the night fell. The temporary darkness draped over the sky and the sea alike, dyeing them in shades of navy blue. With one look at the darkness, Kakashi stood up and prepared to leave, but before he walked out of the door, I just had to ask him about something that was plaguing my mind.

"What happened to Orochimaru?" My question was vague, very vague. I remembered everything I could, the Kannon Bosatsu, the Amaterasu and the silver giant I never got the chance to figure out about. But I wanted to know the aftermath, I wanted to hear the consequences from someone else.

"He escaped, presumably having already taken a new body. Our Intelligence Division lost track of him right after he appeared." He tried really well to mask the hesitation, but I knew he didn't want to tell me. Did he think I would go off and do stupid, impulsive things again? Probably, my actions didn't really offer him another impression. But still, he _could_ have a little faith in me…

I nodded, not to anything particular, because I didn't even know why I was nodding when Orochimaru was clearly not dead. Thankfully, Kakashi seemed to find my nod good enough so he left, leaving the cabin door slightly ajar.

 _I will kill him one day, just because he threatened my brother. Although, next time, I would prefer to stay alive after it._ It was not only that I _had_ something, someone to live for, but more so that I _wanted_ the chance to live for _something_.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

My first impression of the Land of the Snow: it was mesmerizingly familiar.

When we first stepped off the vessel onto this northern land, I could see the enchanting kingdom, forever frozen within the ice and snow. Layers of white, pale blue and grey, covered the landscape, adoring the traditional castle rising on the mountain. However, this serene image was broken by something I was quite familiar with because, in a way, it was the idea of modernity

Metallic railways stretched from the harbour all the way deep into the mountains; the black soot from the train stained the white image in a darker grey much like the image of the industrial revolution; the sleek shape of snowmobiles provided the sharp lines that broke the harmony of this snow-buried kingdom. It was like the winter city of Harbin, the mechanic modernity of the land even made the century-old castle seem foreign.

"Two tickets please, to the capital," I said politely to the women in the ticket booth. She eyed me with curiosity and suspicion, I imagine we probably looked quite out of place. I was wearing a black cape to keep out the cold harsh wind, and it was sticking out like a burning candle at night in this world of grey and white. Slightly behind me, Kakashi was wearing a pale grey cape, it was the same colour as his hair, and the collar of the cape made the image blend together right into the white background.

"Identifications." I handed in our shinobi identifications. This time, we used our real names; Uchiha Maiko, Hatake Kakashi, and we didn't plan to hide it. The women took our IDs, and with a quick glance at the word Konoha, she frowned. She cast us a critical glance before walking off, leaving us standing in front of the ticket booth.

We waited, patiently. There weren't a lot of people around the train station, and despite the technological advancement, it didn't seem proportional to the population of this land. After ten very silent and long minutes, she returned with an emotionless face.

"Here are your tickets. Please have a safe journey, we hope you enjoy your stay in the Land of Snow." I took the tickets and returned her professional voice with a polite smile. It was all politics now, the first one to speak the truth loses.

The train departed shortly after we got on. It wasn't as fast as the bullet train since it mostly ran on coal. However, it was still quite impressive compared to the infrastructure of the rest of this world. If this world did not have any chakra, or ninjutsu or shinobi, the Land of Snow would have been the pioneer of this world, just because it recognised the great value in metal and transportation.

"Now that they have been alerted to our presence, I imagine the negotiations will have to come before the investigation. You might as well read the manual on the trading clauses." My travelling companion threw me the alleged detailed manual from the Jonin Commander himself, and I caught it with ease.

As I flipped through the pages, I saw lines and lines of small words filling the pages like ants. This was completely different from Hokage-sama's half-assed (let's be honest, it's completely half-assed) note, it was probably the epitome of detailed descriptions. Feeling the impending headache and realising the fact that I only had around thirty minutes to memorise this, I activated the Sharingan without another thought.

It took me ten minutes to scan the thirty-page report and process the information. Not that I had any experience of high school life, since being trained in a black ops organization all my previous life pretty much sucked away all the opportunities for career finding, but I suppose this was what Naruto would call 'the cram session before the exam' (although he really only complained about it, so far I had yet to see any academic progress that was the results of these cram sessions he complained so often about. And Sasuke… well, I guess that this was what Sharingans are for).

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but the gist of this is that we can only offer twelve percent extra trade wise for the metals, and if they don't accept, we got no deal?" I summarised. I was sure that there were other details, but they could be discussed later.

"Basically. Usually, with smaller countries, they just want more profit in trades. It's very unlikely that they won't agree to the clauses, simply because of the military powers the elemental nations possess." Kakashi explained. I nodded absentmindedly while staring at the passing sceneries outside the window. There were snowmobiles, railroads, soldiers in armours, and…was that…a _volley cannon_?

"Hey, are you listening?" At the light touch on my shoulder, I snapped my eyes away from the strange machinery and backed into the reality, where I vaguely heard Kakashi mocking me, "Are you sure you didn't hit your head during the last two months?" and I had to re-focus my eyes to get used to the dark shadow inside of the train in comparison to the blinding white outside.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm listening, keep going." I quickly said to keep his worried gaze off of me. It was just that those 'technologies' seemed… too familiar for my comfort.

There was a long pause before he spoke up again, "I know that this is a lot of responsibility. I'm not going to lie, after this mission, your identity as the new Uchiha Clan Head will be exposed, and there will be a lot of attention placed on you, and it might even affect your future careers. But I need you to clear your head now because this is the Hokage-sama's order and we cannot turn back now." His speech was confusing. His voice didn't sound harsh, it was much more like a senpai reassuring a kouhai. However, the content of his speech sounded like an officer reprimanding a subordinate. It almost seemed like he was stuck between deciding the two types of relationships, wavering between the two different attitudes he should use.

I couldn't blame him, defining connections were complicated, and it was probably the fact that we were both socially aloof that we never bothered to define it in the first place. I never thought that as a problem, it worked best that way. Mysteries didn't work well between us, and a defined relationship had boundaries that erased that transparency, or at least, as transparent as we allowed it.

"I know, and I won't turn my back on it. Like you said, an early chance for practice." I flashed him a small smile before turning my attention back to the document, and he didn't bother me again for the rest of the journey. To be honest, I didn't want to look at the document again, I already had it memorised and looking at the ant-like words crawling on the pages just made me want to shut my eyes in irritation.

Then again, I also didn't want to look outside the window. It was almost ironic, which seemed to be the ultimate theme of my life right now. Now that I have decided to just live in this world, as Uchiha Maiko, this development in technology, this…unusual scenery of modernity. It all seemed too familiar to my past life, and anything related to my past life couldn't possibly be good.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Please wait a moment, Daimyo-sama will be here shortly." I resisted the urge to glare at the messenger boy and gave him a perfectly polite smile. How many times had he said that, four? Five? Six? I lost count, but he would be sure to bring it up every ten minutes. Daimyos, they always had the notion that if they made others wait longer, their own pride would be elevated.

"Presenting, the esteemed Snow Daimyo-sama!" With the loud announcement from somewhere in the room, I kneeled to show my respect for the Daimyo. I lowered my legs and dipped my head, but I kept my knee from touching the ground. The Snow Daimyo was not the Daimyo that Konoha swore allegiance to, and as a Daimyo of less status than the Daimyo of the Five Elemental Nations, I did not have to show the same level of respect as I would for the Fire Daimyo.

"Rise." A deep voice called out as I stood up and raised my head, and I saw the Snow Daimyo for the first time. He was not like the Tea Daimyo or the Fire Daimyo, his figure was broad and muscular while his clothes were not fancy or extravagant, and he wore no Daimyo headpieces. He was a warrior, I could tell that much, but it was the condescending and analytical glare in his eyes that alerted my automatic defence mechanism.

Those critical eyes of his thoroughly ran over me first, then they moved onto Kakashi who was standing behind me, slightly to the right. Usually, Kakashi, as my team captain, would be the one standing in the front, and I had absolutely no qualms with that. However, this time, I was supposed to be the lead diplomat, so hiding behind Kakashi's shadow was no longer an option.

"Is this supposed to be the Uchiha Clan Head I was promised an audience with? Run home, girl, and get me your father." He laughed mockingly as he waved his hand at me. _Already starting? And here I thought he at least had some manners as the Snow Daimyo._

"Rest assured, Daimyo-dono, I am the current Uchiha Clan Head," I answered while keeping my eyes to his without any hesitation or wavering of confidence. I was being defiant, but I needed to keep a strong presence in front of the other negotiating party, I needed to establish my own standing.

"Oh, is that so? Then tell me… _Lady Uchiha_ , is it true that the once mighty Uchiha Clan has fallen so much that they would choose a measly girl as the Clan Head?" That was a low blow, and he knew it. But then again, it was nothing I haven't heard before so I kept my composure and smiled at him.

"Thank you for your concern, Daimyo-dono, but the Uchiha Clan is well and the internal affairs are none of your concerns. Shall we begin the negotiation process, I'm afraid I don't have much time and I wouldn't want to intrude your land any further," I picked my words carefully. If Father were here, he might be a little bit proud of the Uchiha arrogance I was currently imitating now.

"You speak well and arrogantly for a little girl, but first, I need to see the proof that you are indeed who you say you are. Show me your sharingan, the so-called legendary dōjutsu." He said with mockery and confidence alike, and I mentally frowned at his request. _Isn't he afraid of the genjutsu I could cast on him? He is either very stupid or very confident in his abilities._

Still, I activated my prided kekkei genkai, showing the blood red eyes that determined my status. I could see greed and avarice in his eyes, like so many before him, the lure of power was endless for the human. However, what alerted me was the chakra flow I was currently seeing: the Snow Daimyo had the flow of chakra on his body, but I could see the unknown mass on his body that seemed to block my vision. Whatever it was, it was effectively protecting his chakra from the outside. No wonder he was so confident, my genjutsu would not be effective against him when I could hardly disrupt his chakra system. As soon as my eyes returned to normal, he clapped his hands very slowly, almost in a rhythmic way.

"Very well, let's begin the negotiations, what does Konoha want with the Land of Snow?" He asked while keeping his eyes on me, pressuring me with his gaze.

"Konoha would like to continue the trade in metal with the Land of Snow. Our Hokage-sama believes that it would be of our mutual interest to do so; putting a stop on such activities would not benefit either party." I answered, remembering one of the lines in Commander Nara's detailed report.

"Oh, and how does this benefit us? The Land of Snow is thriving in the economy, and what can Konohagakure offer that would be of my interest?" the Snow Daimyo said with skepticism.

"We could offer you more profit. Konoha would be willing to retain the old shipment rate while elevating our payment for eight percent of our current price, but of course, with constant supply rate guaranteed." I didn't start with our maximum limit because that would just be stupid in negotiation.

"Only eight percent? You must know that Konoha is not the only shinobi village that wants our metal supply, don't you, _Lady Uchiha_?" He said the last two words with such mockery that my father would probably accuse him of defiling the Uchiha name.

"Of course, Daimyo-dono, but you must also know that the Land of Snow is not our only source for metal supplies. The Land of Iron and some eastern territories would also happily supply Konoha with metal mines. Compared to Konoha, the Land of Snow would have more to lose if the trade is stopped." He narrowed his eyes at me as if he were scrutinising every single one of my words, looking for any weakness in my argument.

"Twenty-five percent increases on the prices, and I will _think_ about the continuing the trade."

"Ten percent, Daimyo-dono, you know full well that no one will pay for the metals at that price."

"Twenty percent." He haggled persistently, and I hardened my eyes at the unreasonable Daimyo in front of me.

"Daimyo-dono, perhaps you do not understand the situation. Konoha is offering you more profit than before, and no other shinobi village will be compliant enough to do so," I said with a newfound coldness.

"Sunagakure and Iwagakure are closest to the Land of Iron, and they will not bother to seek your country out for negotiation. Kumogakure can obtain their metal from the eastern territories, and they are not generous enough to pay what we are offering. Kirigakure is in a state of civil unrest and they will not have the time, nor would they want to, negotiate the trade for more metals to produce weapons that will fuel the unrest even more. Even us, Konohagakure would get a steady supply of metal just from the Land of Iron and the eastern territories, but our Hokage-sama was generous enough to offer you a situation that both of us would benefit from. Surely, Daimyo-dono, you would be sensible enough to see the worth in Konoha's proposal?" I gave him a fake smile. Most of the information I had just spouted were in the Jonin Commander's notes, and I may have exaggerated a bit about Kumogakure. However, the speech was good enough to keep the Snow Daimyo silent for a moment.

"Twelve percent, that is the limit to Konoha's offer." I let the words out slowly, putting our final offer on the table. The Daimyo was still silent, but I could hear the wheels in his head turning, trying to decide on his next move.

"I will have to think about it," finally, he answered, "The Land of Snow would like to offer you a night's stay at the castle, and I shall discuss the offer with my advisors." With a wave of his hand, the servant boy rushed to his side. We waited as the Daimyo whispered a few words into the boy's ear, who nodded quickly. When he was done, he stood up with regal posture and everyone in the court kneeled again except for us.

"My servant will take you to your residence. Tomorrow morning, I will reach my decision. Until then, the Land of Snow offers you our hospitality." As soon as he finished his words, he walked away from the court and disappeared from our line of sight. The servant boy meekly approached us as the court emptied out, all following the departure of their Daimyo-sama.

"Please follow me, Lady Uchiha, I shall take you to your chamber." I followed the servant boy as he led us through the halls and stairs, turning left and turning right like we were navigating the complicated alleyways. I had to admit, the inside of the castle did not look like the outside at all. From the outside, the Kazahana Castle was elegant and sophisticated, while the inside looked more like an abandoned military fort. The building was well kept and everything was expensive and clean, yet there seemed to be no decorations, nor were there any warm lightings. It looked like everything was trapped and kept together by iron-clad chains.

"The Castle has been under renovation lately, and Daimyo-sama regretfully informs you that this is the only room we can offer. He hopes that you will understand, ambassador from Konoha." The boy quickly said and scurried off, leaving us in front of a small and darkly lit room. _Really, Snow Daimyo, really? Is this how you want to play?_ Well, good for him, since I really couldn't care less about where in the world I sleep, it was not like I had never slept in the jungle or anything.

I stepped into the room without hesitation, but my Sharingan was already activated to detect any hidden traps. There weren't any I could see, no wire traps or chakra detection ones. Then again, I was no expert, so our best bet was to not touch anything unnecessarily. Behind me, Kakashi closed the door lightly, isolating us from the rest of the creeping castle.

' _What's next?'_ I flashed the hand signs quickly, the room was dark and my movements were discreet, but I knew that Kakashi could see it, with his Konoha headband already lifted and Sharingan exposed.

' _Leave a shadow clone here first, we will talk about the rest after we are out of the castle.'_ He flashed back a string of hand signals and I nodded. With a few quick hand seals, two shadow clones appeared beside us and I immediately felt the drain of half of my chakra. Shadow clones were good for infiltration and a whole lot more, but I could never get used to the fact that half of _me_ was split and the clone could move and talk just as I could. Now that I thought about it, I should maybe teach Naruto this if he was still having trouble creating a clone. The last time we tried, he managed to make the clone blow up because he put so much chakra into it. However, with the shadow clone, the chakra would split in half evenly and he wouldn't have to worry about chakra control.

Without another word, Kakashi jumped out of the window and I followed him. We slid down the castle walls, coating our feet with chakra and body flickered away from the castle as we approached the bottom of the wall. Honestly, I would never jump out of a building like this in my previous life if I weren't forced to by rounds of gunfire, there was always some form of escape plans that retrieved the agents. OLYMPUS might have been ruthless in exterminating the agents who were 'not needed' anymore, but they cared far too much for their resources invested to abandon a well-trained agent. However, this world had chakra, and I had been trained for another eleven years in shinobi arts, so some laws of physics were bound to be thrown out of the window and I didn't even bat an eyelash as I jumped out of the castle with such carefreeness.

It wasn't until we were at least a few kilometres away from the castle that he slowed down his pace. At this point, I could only see the vague outline of Kazahana Castle obscured by snowstorms and white mountains. The snow plains we were walking on were much like the desolated deserts in Suna. I had already changed my obnoxious out-of-place black coat for a pale grey one just like what Kakashi was wearing. With the hood pulled over my head, the last sign of my raven black hair was obscured and the image of two lonely travellers blended seamlessly into the white kingdom.

"Do you think the Snow Daimyo will agree to our terms?" Kakashi suddenly asked as we trotted through the plains. We were following the network of railroads from far away, but nevertheless, it was a guidance towards one of the biggest mines in the Land of Snow.

"I don't know. He seemed reluctant to agree, but I don't know why he would stop the trade in the first place." My voice just barely reached him over the howls of wind, but he still nodded thoughtfully.

"Which is why we are investigating in the first place. The Snow Daimyo's actions are suspicious. If he is really aiming for more profit, he would have agreed to it by now." Beside him, I tilted my head and looked at him in confusion, silently asking him to elaborate. With a small sigh, he continued.

"The current Snow Daimyo, Kazahana Dotō, staged a coup against his brother seven years ago. He murdered his brother and ascended the throne as the Snow Daimyo. He is a dictator, who is strong enough to keep the country within his grasps. He may have advisors, but they are just titles to keep the appearance up. If he really wants to make a decision, he wouldn't need others' approval, and he certainly isn't the type to listen to anyone else." He explained as we followed the speeding train. He kept his voice flat, very emotionless indeed. Yet, I could faintly hear the faint hint of regret in his voice, so faint that I would not have picked it up if not for the long period of time I have known him.

"You've been to the Land of Snow before?" I asked, but it was more like a statement.

For a while, he didn't answer me. I suppose he didn't have to answer me, I was probably breaching the protocol and boundaries anyway. This transparency thing, it only worked with glass panels separating us. We gain information off of each other, because, let's be honest, we were both so perceptive that no one could win this game of 'who's the better liar'. Yes, we saw each other, but we didn't reach out. He had his past that I couldn't change and I had my secrets, both in this life and the one before that he couldn't understand, nor would he ever. We didn't reach out, we couldn't reach out. We _wouldn't_ reach out.

"That was a long time ago on a mission." Somehow, he answered me, albeit with a vague and superficial reply. As I kept my mouth shut, he continued, "The mine is around ten kilometres away. We will be infiltrating without alerting anyone. Keep your Sharingan open in case you need to cast genjutsu."

The entrance to the mine wasn't hard to find: it was the brightest scene in the snow plain, lit up by shining lamps in the middle of the night. The Land of Snow really took mining seriously, the campsite for the workers was arranged much like a military fort, organised and compacted. There were even some soldiers walking around holding weapons - not swords or lances, but volley guns.

"Well, as our only Sharingan expert who can keep her eyes open without getting a chakra exhaustion, why don't you go take the camp, while I go and scout the metal transport chain or whatever they do at the railway." Even though he had posed the words as a suggestion, I knew that it wasn't really negotiable. "And, don't ―"

"Don't kill anybody in a foreign territory, got it." I finished the sentence for him, earning me a look of warning.

"I was going to say don't take too long, but sure, that's a concern as well." He waved his hand and shooed me towards the brightly-lit campsite before he disappeared into the direction of noisy railway that was covered by the black soot.

I observed the camp for a while, registering all the little dots that were giving off chakra signals. Based on the scattered presence of developed chakra systems (at least to some extent), I'd say that the Snow Country wasn't very concerned with their main source of income. But then again, in this isolated island nation all the way at the North Pole, foreign threats were rare.

Lightly, I sneaked up near the two rare shinobi who were standing guard at one of the camp entries. To be honest, 'standing guard' was a strong expression, considering the fact that both of them were sitting down by the fence, burying themselves with a particularly unpleasant scent.

 _Alcohol. Drinking on the job, what a surprise._ My sense of smell was never very good, but with the stench of alcohol, I could smell it a mile away. I let out a small breath against the strong smell, at this moment, I had no quarrel about finishing this up quickly.

"Oh, what did we do that got us in this Kami forsaken place. There's nothing here save for the blasted metal for who knows what!" One of the guards lamented loudly as he took a large sip of liquor. His weapons slipped on the ground, out of his sight in the shadow.

"You said you want an easy job, well, here's the easiest job," The other one mocked. The first guard jokingly threw the canteen at him, he caught it then took a large drink as well.

"Yeah, I suppose that you have a point. No life is better than an easy life!" They both laughed loudly just when I had felt like I was done being surrounded by sake stenches. Quietly, I stepped out of the fences and none of them noticed me until I was right in front of them.

They never really had the chance to get sober, because the moment they saw the spinning Sharingan, their mind went dazed again. Their bodies relaxed on the ground, the canteen of alcohol slipped between their fingers and the alcohol splashed all over the cold icy ground. By the time they woke up, they would probably assume that they had drunk themselves to sleep the moment they saw the empty canteen.

I bolted through the camp, flickered from one tent to another based and flashed between the miners who had absolutely no idea what the hell was going on. I was quite lucky so far since the number of shinobi here was so scarce. However, if any one of them were unlucky to come in my way, the Sharingan was pretty much a cheat sheet. Oh, how much I had missed my eyes; the two months in the village was boring as hell. It only took mere minutes to reach the mine entrance. But before I could storm in and be done with it, I stopped behind one of the tents when I heard a trail of footsteps coming out of the mine.

"Finally, the shift is done! I thought my hands were going to drop." I heard one of the miners speak up, then it was followed by the clanking sound of metal being discarded into the ground.

"Man, I feel tired, I'm just glad that I wasn't sick like some of the others."

"Ah, it's the poisonous miasma, I tell you. I've been working in the mine for decades, never have I felt so uncomfortable in the metal caves."

"Well, there's nothing we can do, we don't have the shinobi's chakra, and it's not like our Daimyo-sama listens ―" "Shut up! Do you want to die? The shinobis here would kill you on sight!" The voices became silent for a moment before a flurry of footsteps carried all the miners away.

It took me a moment to register that the new information was bad news. _Alcohol and poisonous miasma, the working condition in the Land of Snow is on another level._ Judging by the unconcerned shinobis at the gate, I was quite sure that circulating the chakra rapidly could help with dispensing most poison, but that would be like waving a flag saying "I'm here! Foreign shinobi here!".

"Move along! Daimyo-sama ordered that the mining should not be stopped at any second!" The shinobi at the front of the ushered along, by the drowsy stench on him, I would assume that he was drinking quite happily as well. To be fair, alcohol was great for warming the body in the cold. Besides, it was definitely easier to make them believe the genjutsu if their mind wasn't clear in the first place.

I snuck up behind the team of workers and entered the mine with them. At first, everything seemed normal, with the dim oil lamps and scattered rocks. "Work quickly! Daimyo-sama wants the production of four carts every shift! I'm sure you all know what would happen if the quota were not met!" Actually, I didn't know what would happen, but I could probably guess. Soon, all the miners spread out into different positions, making the rhythmic sound of metals rattled against each other like a symphony in discord.

Everything was normal, that is until I felt my very own chakra slipping away. Something was sipping out my chakra like a straw. The jittery feeling ran across my skin as mild nausea soaked through my body. No wonder the civilian miners felt sick, with their undeveloped chakra circulation, even missing a single bit of chakra could cause discomfort. But for shinobi, whose concentrated chakra system was often in circulation, there was a constant supply of chakra produced to fill the loss rather quickly. Unfortunately, rapid and concentrated chakra system was a lighthouse for identifying shinobis. _Obnoxious Daimyo, alcohol, and chakra eating miasma, I freaking_ love _this country._

I was very curious, as to why the Snow Daimyo wanted all those metals for. Initially, I thought that maybe the Land of Snow had trouble continuing the mining because of this sickly miasma. However, the mining wasn't slowing down at all. If anything, it was only speeding up.

Anyway, I was here to investigate, so I might as well get onto it. Like a crazy person, I kicked a pile of rocks and let the loud crashing sound fill the suffocating cave. If this wouldn't get the shinobi's attention, then I didn't know what would.

"Hey! You there! What the hell! Get to work seriously!" As expected, the shinobi stormed angrily behind the rock where I was standing. In less than a fraction of a second, I grabbed his collar and pulled him down. Against the overwhelming alcoholic breath, I stared into his angry and shocked pupils. Shortly after, his eyes lost focus.

I whispered into his ear, "Now, answer me honestly in a low voice. What's the use of all the metals?" I could see the chakra system in his head going haywire, and it definitely wasn't caused by the alcohol. Under this state of confusion, he wouldn't be able to distinguish anything, let alone remember what he answered.

"Daimyo-sama wants all the metal to be used in the production of chakra armour and some newly developed weapons." He answered me obediently in a small voice, just loud enough for me to hear.

"What is the chakra armour?" I asked again, remembering that black hole that seemed to block me from identifying and accessing Dotō's chakra system.

"I don't know … my access is too low …" _Well, of course, you work in a goddamn mine scaring civilians after all._ His voice started to sound confused like he was trying to think of something. This was not good, the nausea was starting to affect my own focus as well, and it seemed like the questions I asked were starting to breach a dangerous boundary.

"What about the poisonous miasma in the mine? What is it?" I asked hurriedly as I refocused my control.

"Some miners got sick, but after a day or two to rest, they are well again. I don't know what it is, this mine is new, but Daimyo-sama is especially keen on some of the new mines discovered." _Thanks, that was helpful, alcohol breath._

"Alcohol breath, now remember, you got drunk and started to hear things." As soon as I let go of him, he took a step, presumably to steady himself. However, all he managed to do was to trip on his own feet and had to lean on the rock walls to gain support. Amazing, now he was truly drunk on genjutsu.

Without any hesitation, I flickered out of the cave. I bolted out of the campsite and passed by the guards at the entrance who were still sleeping soundly. When I returned to the landmark fifty meters from the campsite, Kakashi was already waiting for me. I didn't know if I should feel amused or insulted that he had his book open as if I took a really long time to get the job done.

"They are using all the metal for armour and weapon production. Oh, they have some kind of chakra-eating contamination in the mines, but the Daimyo couldn't care less about his citizen's health," I reported in a bland voice. Kakashi closed his book and placed it back into his storage seal in a very slow motion as if savouring whatever inappropriate content he had just read.

"I noticed. Most of the metals mined were the common types used in weapons, however, they were shipped in the direction of the Capital, not the harbour. It seems that Dotō wants more than just money for profit." He said with an unreadable expression, not that I was very successful at reading his expressions in the first place, with the mask and all. However, I did understand the undertone of his sentences. Mass weapon production could only mean one thing: militarization. The Land of Snow was preparing for some armed conflict, and whatever purpose it was for, it was not good news for Konoha.

"But first of all, let's get back to the castle before anyone finds out we infiltrated the mine." Before I could think any further, Kakashi had already pulled up the pale grey hood and walked away, back towards the direction we came from.

"Wait, what? We already got the information, so why can't we just leave? Judging by his intent of militarization, the Snow Daimyo wouldn't possibly agree to the trade clauses we've proposed." I voiced out my confusion as I followed him. If there was the possibility that this country would go to war, I wanted to get out of here as fast as possible.

"And you suck at being diplomatic." He was awfully blunt today. "What would they think of Konoha's reputation if one their ambassador, a Clan Head no less, left in secret before informing the Daimyo?" That, I didn't have an answer to.

"Shadow clones don't last forever, and just half the chakra won't last us to the border. Calm down, they don't know that we have already investigated their mines. We just have to sit tight and wait for him to reject your offer, then we can officially leave." Kakashi reassured me and I hesitantly pulled up my hood as well. He made a good point and it was not like I could argue with him. I just barely scraped into his good side after the Orochimaru fiasco, and angering my captain again was probably not the brightest move.

Eventually, we started our excruciatingly cold journey back to the Kazahana Castle. Kakashi was right, at the rate I was using the fire natured chakra to keep myself warm, we would not last very long, especially while keeping a shadow clone.

It seemed like my bad luck still hadn't worn off yet, even if I was basically at the North Pole. The journey back was serene, but it wasn't until we were a bit over a hundred meters from the castle that I felt something 'returned' to me.

Suddenly, the memory of something ambushed me while I was sleeping flashed in my mind. My shadow clone popped, and that was never a good sign. Especially when it wasn't an accident. Kazahana Dotō had 'killed' me, or at least he had attempted to.

I turned my face towards Kakashi and he did the same. From our mutually shocked expressions, I assumed that his shadow clone had probably popped as well. The castle in front of us lit up with bright lights all of a sudden and I narrowed my eyes at the small figures appearing one by one on the castle wall. They were all soldiers armed with volley guns which were pointed in our direction.

"Who said that this is a _small_ mission with _minimal_ fighting and that the Daimyo won't do _anything_ to us?" At this point, it was pretty clear that the Snow Daimyo wanted us out of the picture. Whether it was because he had learned of our little expenditure in the mine, which was unlikely, or simply because he was a paranoid bastard, it didn't really matter. It doesn't change the fact that he was mobilising his entire army to shoot us full of holes.

"Not now. This is really not the time to play the 'I told you so' game." Kakashi responded with a scowl, but there were no indication that he was afraid. The soldiers were starting to file out of the castle gate, all uniformly wearing the same pale greyish-blue armour that blocked my access to their chakra systems.

"Your order, Captain?" I asked as a shower of kunais and shurikens rained down on us. They had fired the volley guns. The only course of action seemed pretty obvious as we bolted and ran, dodging and hacking the projectiles away.

"Now, we run and get back to Konoha alive."

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A/N: lol, you can't call it a life without being a fugitive at least once. Confession time: I seriously don't know what to say this time. Umm... the date of Maiko's death or rebirth is actually the date I wrote the first sentence. XD I wrote that overly dramatic first sentence because at that moment, that seemed to be the rational course of action when you were an overly dramatic high school student and you just had the exam from hell on June the 18th.


	28. Chapter 28 - Winter Wonderland

A/N: So this chapter is not fully beta'd because my beta is busy, and it's really long for some reason. Also, I need to take a break for a week because my real life is quite stressful at the moment, so there won't be an update next Saturday, but there will definitely be one in two weeks at most. During this week, I'll go back and edit this chapter when I have time. So I apologise in advance.

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Chapter 28 - Winter Wonderland

 _I am never coming back to the Land of Snow again._

It was not because of how cold the country was, nor was it because of the lack of tourist attractions in this god forsaken land. No, those were not the reasons. It was simply because of the fact that they had tried to kill me when I hadn't even planned on killing any of them (if I had, then that would be a different story). But now, I was definitely going to kill some of them.

It wasn't long before we were surrounded by soldiers popping up from the nearby railway. They had snowmobiles, and we were on foot. This was a declaration of war, but under the circumstances that we could return and inform the Konoha first, since when dealing with foreign relations, no bodies meant no evidence.

What was not helping the case was the fact that somehow, they had developed a chakra armour that could negate ninjutsu and I found out about that the hard way. I blew out five great fireballs one by one and set them free on the hordes of Snow shinobi. The icy cold weather of the country was undermining the power of my fire jutsu, but for mass damages, the fireballs were the most efficient choice.

They were supposed to be incinerated, but the moment my fireballs touched the shinobis, it was out like a poof. Instead, I was greeted by rows of ice spikes rising from beneath my feet. I jumped, turned and twirled in the air to dodge the incoming impalers. Eventually, I found a landing spot on one of the spikes, but a shower of kunais and senbons rained down on me.

Earth wall was not an option here, since one: the land was covered by ice, and two: I was not even standing on the ground. Therefore, I went for the old-fashioned way: kenjutsu and dodging. My sword parried apart the projectiles easily like leaves, and for those I couldn't catch, I dodged.

When I landed back next to Kakashi, my breathing was slightly hitched due to the high-speed movements I had just performed. He looked like he was having his fair share of trouble, but overall, he seemed to be holding well against the army.

"Any solution to the chakra negating armour?" I whispered to my teammate as we stood cautiously in the middle of hundred-some shinobis. We were at an impasse. Kakashi and I couldn't do anything to them because of their sheer numbers and the armour; the Snow shinobis knew that their attacks were ineffective against us. Actually, now that I thought about it, it was not an impasse, we were simply at a disadvantage. We were trapped.

"Taijutsu. If we can't blast them to pieces, then we might as well get rid of their heads." Yeah, Kakashi was definitely angry. Contrary to popular belief, taijutsu could be just as deadly as ninjutsu. As Anbu agents, we couldn't kill people the flashy way using ninjutsu, so taijutsu became our main area of focus.

"Understood." Leaving only a whisper behind, I appeared in front of one of the snow shinobis. The first head came off quite easily, his face was frozen with a shocked expression as I sliced my sword through his neck. My captain had just given me the permission to eliminate foreign shinobis on a diplomatic mission, and that was the best piece of news I'd heard all day.

A few more bodies dropped before they had the brain capacity to realise what the hell had happened. Kakashi and I were aiming to open up a hole in the circle, and at first, it was quite effective. The armour only protects their body and head, not their neck. Ninjutsu might not be precise enough to slice through that sliver of skin, but swords definitely could. Dozens of bodies fell under our blades, their blood spraying all over me and dyeing the white ground red. However, It didn't take long before the horde of shinobis realised the severity of the situation and started to thicken their defences. Taijutsu could be deadly, but it could also be ineffective against great numbers. Once again, we were stuck.

The shinobis moved cautiously around us in a circle, swords pointed inwards and volley guns raised at our heads. I could see the fear in their eyes that caused them to hesitate and it was all because of the cut up bodies at our feet. Everyone wants to live, no one wants to die.

"There has to be a limit as to how much chakra the armour can negate. We just have to break it." _Yes, and that would be easy because…_ It was not going to be easy, but Kakashi's suggestion was a sound one, hell, at least it was much better than the impasse we were facing now.

"Let's see," I answered. Silently, I sheathed my tantō, raising only the ninjatō in an offensive stance. If we were talking about great damage to a single target without counting the Mangekyou Sharingan, then Chidori Blade was my best option.

As I honed the concentrated lightning chakra into my blade, the sound of a thousand birds chirping replaced the harsh siren of the wind. The crackling electricity filled the blade in an instant, dancing and resonating with the other source of lightning chakra besides me. On an invisible cue, we charged.

The Chidori Blade extended faster than the human eyes could reach and crashed into the chakra armour. I could see it making a large crack on the shinobi's armour as that shinobi's face contorted in fear. _Come on, just a bit more_ , I thought hopefully, willing the Chidori to pierce a little deeper. But I could feel the power being negated and drained as the shinobi's fearful expression changed into a smirk and that made me desperately want to kill this guy. I guess that the only consolation was that the armour did break in the end, the remaining crackling electricity was just enough to shatter both the armour and his smirk before it disappeared into the darkness.

Somewhere in the crowd, another shinobi dropped dead as well. Before any of the enemies really got a picture of what had happened until Kakashi bounced back to my position, breathing heavily. _It doesn't matter, we get the situation._ Kakashi and I couldn't keep up with A-rank jutsu all day, and the taijutsu was getting ineffective by the second. Come on, after so many of their own got slashed by the neck, they were bound to pick up the tip of "protect your neck from sharp blades".

 _This is bad. We are in a desperate situation, and a desperate situation calls for desperate actions._

"If I can get your five seconds, can you get us out of here?" I asked lightly. What I was planning to do was crazy, but I did prefer to get out of here alive and in one piece.

"What―"

"We need a mass jutsu that can blow a path out for us. I can do that. But after that, I will be vulnerable, and I want to get out of here." I didn't let him finish his accusatory phrase. _He doesn't have the right to be angry with me. This time, I can swear with my heart that I wasn't the one who waltzed into this sketchy situation. Kazahana Dotō is just crazy._

"Yes." He didn't waste time in giving me a clear answer, and that was all I needed.

Without hesitation, I pushed all of my chakras into my eyes, feeling them shift into the asymmetrical mangekyou sharingans, and then… _Come on, silver giant, I don't know what you are yet, but I need your help…_ a silver mass surrounded me and for a second, I felt… strong.

It didn't matter if every cell in my body was hurting like hell; the silver ribcage blocked out all the incoming kunais and ice spears like an impenetrable fortress. I willed the bony hands to swing in a wide circle around us. Like a gorilla swatting down flies, the armoured shinobi were being swept aside as though they were nothing. They were not Orochimaru, and they didn't have the crazy regeneration ability he had. Even if it weren't my hand, I could feel several of them being crushed from inside out upon impact.

Like I expected, my chakra was draining fast as I kept on swatting the shinobi aside, slowly pushing a path out of the heavily crowded circle. The armour might not be able to absorb this mass amount of _something_ I produced, but it was definitely draining it at a rate faster than I could replace.

I walked forward slowly, against the showers of projectiles and ninjutsus. Occasionally, there were a few explosions here and there, although I wasn't sure if that was intentional or due to the damaged chakra armours exploding.

 _Three, four, five…_ the five seconds were up just as I pushed the last horde of shinobi aside and opened up a small, narrow path in front of us. _This should be enough, right?_ My determination wavered and the silver giant flickered.

There was a sound like 'bang', and then, I felt something scrape past my waist, leaving a trail of searing pain on my skin.

I turned around and stared at the direction of the castle with disbelief. There were only less than ten people standing by the castle gate, but every one of them was holding a volley gun. _They have more of these monstrosities?_ By the familiar sensation of pain that I had just felt, the projectiles coming out of those guns were definitely not kunais. They were smaller, sharper, and much much faster.

Before I could even regain my balance, something or someone grabbed me and ran and therefore saved me from being blasted to pieces by lots and lots of metal pieces falling out of the sky. With one well-placed body flicker, Kakashi moved past the fallen Snow shinobi and started our poorly planned escape to Kami-knows-where.

When we were finally out of the circle of shinobis, I didn't have the time to celebrate, because the moment I raised my eyes, I saw the volley guns being reloaded and aimed us.

Damn it. I couldn't believe that I was going to die here of all places. I was prepared for the chance of dying on a mission. Hell, I was even prepared to die while killing Orochimaru or on my journey to find Itachi. _But Land of Snow, really?_

As the projectiles sailed over the sky, I wondered if we could out run them or parry them away with swords. However, it seemed like that was not needed. Before the shower of kunai-but-maybe-not could reach us, they all slowed down and their pathways converged. Like a whirlpool, they were sucked in by some unknown gravity until they disappeared.

I watched the scene unfold in front of me with amazement. It was an instinct that told me this time-space jutsu or something was the result of Mangekyou Sharingan, and there was only one more Sharingan-user around here.

Kakashi's left eye changed to a shape I had never seen before, like a three bladed Fuuma Shuriken. As he continued to suck the metal shrapnels into whatever dimension he had, his eye bled. Blood gathered on his eyelid and dripped down his face and onto the mask.

Not all of the projectiles were sucked in before he had to force his eye shut. However, it did slow them down considerably, enough for me to actually react and do something.

"You know, I fully expect you to get me out of here, even if you have to carry my dead body," I said to Kakashi as I took a step in front of him and started to make hand seals in blurred motions.

As I released all my chakra as wind-natured energy, a storm of cyclone appeared in front of us. The mini cyclone stirred up the snow from the ground and wrapped around all the projectiles currently flying through the air. The hope was that the projectiles' paths would be distorted (and maybe even turn around and hit a few Snow shinobis) and the dust of snowflakes would be able to cover up our trials.

The problem was that I didn't have enough chakra to maintain a proper Fūton: Whirlwind Dance, so instead of a controllable cyclone that was big enough to absorb all the projectiles in its current, all I got was a small rickety tornado that looked like it was falling apart.

After that, the memory was hazy, seeing that I had exhausted my chakra with that last ditch effort. However, I did remember being hit by one of the wild metal pieces at _somewhere_ very painful.

Then, I remembered that I fell down and hit my head on the ground.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I woke up to a sharp pain in my body. It was a normal reaction, I supposed, but what really troubled me was the fact that I couldn't pinpoint where the pain was.

I winced loudly as I pushed myself off of the ground. Now that my consciousness was returning, I could vaguely pinpoint the two spots on my body that hurt like hell: my head and my stomach.

"Lie down, or you'll start to bleed again." I heard that familiar voice as I rubbed my temple lightly. Obediently, I lay back down on the icy floor and the straining pain on my stomach was indeed relieved for a second.

"Where are we?" I asked. I ran my hand down the side of my stomach and found the familiar touch of bandage soaked in blood. Just for the sake of curiosity, I pressed down on the wound. A flash of pain erupted immediately, but then it faded quickly and no more blood seemed to seep through. _Great, no internal organ damage, that's something to celebrate for._

"Two hundred metres behind the Kazahana Castle. My pack dug an ice cave underground, so we will be safe here for a while." _Oh, that explains the temperature here … wait, behind Kazahana Castle!_

"You took us back to the enemy's fortress?" I sat up abruptly and yelled, completely ignoring his order to lie down. I saw Kakashi sitting down on the ground, leaning against the wall on the other side of the cave. One of his shoulders was wrapped up in bandages as well. If not for the fact that he was injured as well, I would definitely say something about that disapproving look on his face.

" _Behind_ the castle, Maiko, be grateful that we are not _in_ the castle dungeon. They blocked the roads to the harbour, and I couldn't exactly fight my way out carrying your body, can I? They will be expecting us on the trails to the harbour, but they won't be thinking of searching their backyard for awhile." Despite his infuriating attitude, I had to admit that he had a point. Well, he always had a point that I couldn't refute.

I pushed myself further up from the ground and supported myself on the walls as well. The cave was dark, even with the ice fractals that surrounded us. The dim light at the break of dawn provided just enough lighting for me to see the blasted projectiles that cleaved off part of my skin.

It definitely wasn't the kunai I was used to. The metal was smaller than a standard shinobi kunai for throwing and it didn't have a handle. Instead, it almost looked like as if the tip of a kunai was broken off to make it more aerodynamically favourable. If I didn't know better, I would have mistaken it for bullets.

This world didn't have modern weapons, kunai and shurikens were the closest things to a gun. Despite the apparent faster speed a bullet could travel, they could only be used in conjunction to a gun, and shinobis liked hands-on weapons much, much more. I had the knowledge of a gun's structure, but I never thought of introducing it here. I was content with the way things worked here, and I wanted to keep it that way.

However, somebody must have thought different. One way or another, someone stumbled on the way to built volley guns. It was not a secret that the Land of Snow had more advanced infrastructures and technology since more than five years ago. The harsh environment they lived in pushed for innovation, and the natural resources they mined gave them the ability to do so. Railways, power generators, snowmobiles and chakra armour. Even if the main power supply they used was more chakra than electricity, the idea was the same.

I supposed it was inevitable that they would move onto weapons after all the living conditions were met, especially considering how aggressive their current Daimyo was. A weapon like a kunai that had a longer range, one that would cause more damage and require fewer materials to make. It was logical to think that it was the next advancement in war if ninjutsu didn't exist. The only reason why I had never seen it in use before was probably because of how overpowering ninjutsu could be, but with the development of the chakra armour, I wasn't so sure anymore.

Ninjutsu was shinobi's way of life, and chakra was the base of it. It was not a secret that equipment that could restrain chakra existed, that was how prisoners were kept. Just like how the Snow army graciously demonstrated earlier, chakra-negating armour kept the long range ninjutsu in check and projectiles could most definitely counter the short-range taijutsu, especially if it was raining all over the sky.

"What now?" I asked the question of the day. From what I could tell, we had two issues. One, how to get past the soldiers. Two, how to get away from the island nation.

He stayed silent for a while as he closed his eyes in concentration. His mask was still stained with blood, but then again, we were covered in blood - mostly our enemy's blood which I was kind of proud of - that made the air full of metallic taste.

"How are you feeling?" He asked out of nowhere.

"Oh, I'm feeling like crap, but the wound is mild, so I can fight or do whatever it is you want me to do," I answered quickly. "How's your shoulder?"

"Mild, whatever your definition for that is." The satire in there was over the roof.

"Right now, our priority is to get ourselves out of here. Since the only way out is through the sea route, as long as we can get on an official vessel from the Fire Country at the last moment, we can get out. The only confidence the Snow Daimyo has in killing us is because no one will find out. But a whole vessel is so important that if he dared to attack it, he would surely be found out." Kakashi explained and I nodded in understanding. He was right, any vessel from the Fire Country would not turn us away since Konoha was under the Fire Daimyo's protection and had the status as the Fire Country's biggest military force.

"As for now, we are relatively safe here. The Snow Daimyo knows that the only way we can escape is through the harbour. He will be putting most of his defence in wait at the harbour instead of searching for us. That gives us some time to recover some of our strength." _That's all good, but it's not the real problem._ The real problem was how to get past the defence line. Ninjutsu was obviously ineffective, and our numbers were simply too small. Otherwise, I would say a full on taijutsu battle was not a bad idea. There was just something really relieving when you cut down your enemy with a blade, especially when you were really angry at being attacked for no legitimate reason.

"We need to figure out a way to get past the defence line, or everything will fail," I stated. For a few seconds, Kakashi didn't respond. I could see his gears turning, trying to reach a conclusion using the discouraging information we had. It was either bad or worse, but I refused to believe this was the worst. Trust me when I say that in terms of the level of messed-up, this mission could be ranked ten out of ten. However, just two months ago, I had a mission that could be ranked as an eleven on my scale. Compared to Orochimaru, I would rather take my chances with the Snow shinobi.

"I can get the silver giant out again, that should be able to push us a path," I suggested since it seemed to be the only thing working from our previous battles.

"No. You don't have enough chakra to maintain it. When we get to the harbour, there will be five times as many soldiers, waiting for us. If you get stuck in the middle and exhausted all your chakra, there's no fallback route for retreat." He shot me down so fast that I didn't even have time to explain.

"What about Amaterasu, the fire will keep on burning and it will spread through the shinobi. It will be like a goddamn firework."

"That would be nice to watch, except that you are not actually listening to me. In order for us to get through, how many do you have to burn, a hundred, two hundred? The only way an assault would work is if we have both a decoy and a backup. If you can't see, we don't exactly have any of them." I really wanted to hit him, just because he sounded like he was right all the time, even if he _was_ right most of the time. We needed three things: long-lasting decoys, believable disguises, and some backup would be nice. It was a chain of failsafe, ensuring that if one failed, we still had another choice. Right now, two people couldn't exactly cover all three services.

"Shadow clones for the decoy?"

"Not with its inefficient chakra cost and the one-hit wonder." I frowned at his crisp words.

"Transformation jutsu?"

"They have armours that suck ninjutsu, and we have to get through hundreds of them. Just a disguise won't get us too far." My eyes twitched.

"You are just full of approval today, aren't you?" I crossed my arms over my chest and stared at his flawlessly emotionless expression.

"Just assessing the ideas, and so far, you are not living up to the standards." He stared back with a hint of mockery.

"Well, you are not contributing to the ideas. Why don't we just go back to the castle and try to kidnap the Daimyo, since you so graciously took us right to his backyard?" My voice was full of sarcasm, but after seeing Kakashi's unimpressed expression, I suddenly regretted the ill-timed response. I sounded harsher than my intent. He didn't have a choice and he had picked the best route under the pressure. I should be thanking him for saving my life.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way," I said reluctantly. Suddenly, I found the bandages on my stomach really interesting as I dipped my head and wondered how hard it was to say a 'thank you'. However, Kakashi let out an unexpected snort. Maybe the pressure was finally getting to him as well.

"Since we're out of ideas, just entertain me. What were you going to do after you kidnapped the Daimyo?" Kakashi asked half-heartedly.

"I don't know, ransom him for a passage home? Right now, I just want to beat the crap out of him. I came here perfectly nice and polite, and now I am a fugitive on an island nation." It wasn't a very good joke, but it helped to take my mind off of the impending problem we were supposed to solve.

For a second, he just stayed silent and it made me think that maybe I had gone overboard with bad jokes again. However, when I look up again and saw that calculating glint in his eyes, I knew that I had just dug my own grave.

"You do realise that it was a joke, right? Kidnapping the Daimyo? I know that it sounds easy and, I'll admit, really tempting, but it's suicidal!" It was funny, I had always thought that he would be the one who would be saying these things to me, not the other way around.

"Funny how you should say that," he responded nonchalantly. "In fact, I think we have a better chance of sneaking into the castle than getting past the border at the rate Dotō is deploying his army. After all, no risk, no gain." With that last word, he stood up, walked over to me, and extended his hand.

I stared at him for a while until I was absolutely sure that there was no hesitation in his face. Then, I took his hand and let him pulled me up from the ground.

"We better have a damn good plan other than just walking up the walls and breaking in through the windows."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

It turned out, our plan was basically just walking up the walls and breaking in through the windows.

We picked the route that we used earlier to get out of the Kazahana castle and it lead us directly to the room where we were semi-killed.

I would imagine that the security of the castle was better than this, but with Dotō's strong desire to kill us at all cost, the troops were mostly out searching for us - or rather, trails of bizarre incidents caused by Kakashi's ninkens. There were only a few teams still left at the castle, and most of them were stationed at the front.

After all, who would be crazy enough to go back to the enemy's camp after finally escaping it?

Right. Us.

Still, I wouldn't let my guard down. Kazahana Dotō was a paranoid bastard no matter who he wanted to kill. By the time I popped through the window and landed in the sorry pile of wood that they called 'the guest room', I could already hear the heavy footsteps of soldiers surveying the hallway.

We squeezed into that little space the Daimyo called the 'closet' as we hid from the soldiers passing by. It turned out, it was the only thing that still had a cover; even the door of the room was gone. I peeked past the closet doors and for the first time, I actually saw what Dotō did to kill me.

The room was full of wooden splinters and charred dust. Scattered kunais and shurikens were stuck on the floors and the walls. Basically, most of the wooden furnishing in this room were gone, leaving only the charred remains and the stone wall underneath. My guess was, they tried to take us by surprise with the volley guns but in the end, it was a few small and concentrated explosions that had really 'killed' us.

Feeling the rage boil up inside of me, I took a step back and closed the door. The team of soldiers were almost gone; I could hear their footsteps diminishing. By the sounds, there were probably a dozen shinobi in one patrol team. A bit overkill for Dotō - actually, no, considering that I was planning to kill or kidnap him, I'd say that he underestimated us. If we had to, I was sure that we could get rid of one team. The problem was how to do it silently because I was sure there would be lots of screaming.

' _Chamber or throne room?'_ I signalled my captain. It took him a second to open his eye, but he was just in time to see my signs.

' _Probably the throne room. He has got to satisfy his ego somehow.'_ He signalled back.

' _Should we split up?'_ I asked. He stayed still for a while before answering me.

' _No. We can't afford to be split up in here. We move together and we leave together.'_ I nodded as we pushed open the closet doors and ventured into the hallway.

"Feels like I'm back in Nishikawa's mansion again," I muttered under my breath as I peered past the corners. Even though the technology here was more advanced than Konoha, their shinobi arts weren't that great. Instead of seals and traps, the Snow Daimyo relied on troops and his stupid armours. When I heard no one coming, I started to walk down the hall with Kakashi right beside me.

"Yeah, what exactly happened there? Why the hell would you go for the front entrance like some firestorm when you have the back exit mapped out?" As we trotted down the hall, Kakashi decided that it was the perfect time to dig up the bad history.

"I'll tell you if you tell me what happened on your last mission to Snow." I shot back and immediately, he went silent. "Yeah, I don't think so."

"They are not the same thing." _Of course, when are they ever the same?_ Usually, it would be a really bad thing if a team of soldiers just happened to pass by. However, at this point, it was very effective in stopping this conversation that had gone into the deep end.

Immediately, I tucked myself behind a corner and watched as the trail of soldiers moved past the frame at the end of the hall. Kakashi was standing behind me as he crouched down with a kunai slipped out of his jacket.

"Hang on, I smell something." I tightened my grip on my swords when I heard the footsteps stop.

"What, your paranoia?" A chorus of laughter erupted at the other end of the hall, but that just made my body tensed because I heard the thudding footsteps come down the hall, towards where we were hiding.

"No, it smells like … blood." _Shit, I forgot that we are covered in blood._ I turned around to get a cue from Kakashi, and with one look, I knew exactly what we were going to have to do.

As he walked closer, the laughter faded, leaving only a trail of solemn footsteps behind. It only took him seven seconds to reach the end of the hall, but for me, those seven seconds felt like forever as I anticipated the moment he would peer past the corner when I would reach out and pull his neck back.

And that was exactly what I did. Everything went to hell the moment when I grabbed his neck, twisted it, and threw his body back to his teammates. Kakashi jumped out of the hiding place as the rest of the soldiers fell back like dominos. Oh, their highly prized chakra armour did absolutely shit against the swords and kunai. When in doubt, go with the old-fashion way.

I slammed one of the soldiers onto the ground before I stabbed my tantō through his neck. More blood sprayed out when I pulled the swords out, but I didn't have time to worry about the scarlet colour when another soldier loomed over me.

I kicked his right knee as he tried to punch me. He fell rather ungracefully, but before he could yell, I had already put a slash in his trachea. A few more fell down when Kakashi threw some shurikens in deadly curves that landed right on their faces.

As I hit the last soldier in the neck with the hilt of my sword, he went unconscious and fell down, right onto Kakashi's kunai. Quickly and silently, I walked around the bodies and pulled out any projectile weapons that were stuck on them. Right now, every piece of metal counts.

"I'm guessing there's no way to hide this, is there?" I asked when I saw my teammate standing by the walls, staring at the pile of bodies and spreading pools of blood with distaste.

"We just have to move faster, before they discover this. Come on, we are almost at the throne room." I followed him quickly into another hallway and then another one after that. He was following the trails we had memorised from when Dotō's messenger boy had led us to the guest room. Since the corridor was on the desolated side of the castle and we hardly gave those soldiers a chance to say a word before all of them turned into corpses, I'd say that we had maybe ten, fifteen minutes before the bloody pools were discovered.

The morning was starting to settle in and even the dreadful monotone colour scheme in the castle couldn't cover up the bright light shed by the sun. When the smell of food rolled in, I suddenly realised that it was breakfast time.

"It's the breakfast time. He should be in the dining hall," I whispered. The problem now was, I had no clue where the dining hall was. It seemed that Kakashi had realised the same problem because he promptly stopped on his tracks. He just stood there for a while before finally starting to move again. However, I could tell that he was moving in a direction foreign to both of us.

It didn't take long for me to realise what he was doing because the aroma of food had quickly gotten stronger and stronger. Eventually, after a few corridors, we arrived at the place where the aroma originated from. The kitchen.

"About Nishikawa's mission, he was dealing in the human trafficking business." I didn't know why I would say that, especially now. But as we followed the servant boy who carried a tray of cuisine - the same one who kept on telling me to wait for the Daimyo - through the narrow passage, I decided that there was no better time to make a conversation. My captain didn't say anything, instead, he just walked on and listened.

"He tried to drug me and sell me, so I played along and waited until they thought I was safely locked in a box." I paused for a second before continuing, "I was planning to kill Nishikawa quickly, but there were other children there, kept in the same room. They would have faced a fate far worse than before if Nishikawa had been killed right at that moment."

"So I told them to wait until I could create a diversion and then they should run away through the exit by the bathhouse. After that. I —" "You decided to go out the farthest exit and take every shinobi with you." He finished the sentence for me and I nodded. The boy was still walking unsuspectingly in front of us. He wasn't wearing any chakra armours, so I could see his chakra system at the brain very clearly.

"That's it? You could have just told me and I wouldn't think that you had some suicide tendency." _Well, first of all, that's an overkill. Secondly, I've got a freaking witness still alive and well in the village. Oh, and apparently, he seems to hate me._

"It's embarrassing, It shouldn't have happened, that's not what I was supposed to do. That's not what I was …" _trained to do._ I caught myself before I could finish that sentence. _Trained by whom? OLYMPUS doesn't exist here._ No matter how much I tell him, there was no way that I was ever going to tell him about _that_ place.

"We face choices on every mission. For example, I'm pretty sure that there are some protocols about no kidnapping Daimyo on a diplomatic trip, but still, here we are," He said. "Anbu missions aren't that black and white. Nothing is ever that black and white. That being said, I'm not telling you that you can just do whatever you want as long as it gets the job done." Oh yes, there was always a lecture that followed. But for that moment, I was very glad that even in this situation, I still had a mentor that I could make small talks with.

"The last time I went to the Land of Snow, I was supposed to protect the Snow Daimyo - not Dotō, the previous Daimyo, his brother. Dotō planned a coup that caught us off guard, and I failed. The Daimyo asked me to protect his daughter instead, and that's probably the only good thing out of that mission." Okay, I did not expect that. Even though he only said three sentences, that was about three sentences more than what he would tell me normally.

"You don't have to tell me, I wasn't making a trade," I muttered as the messenger boy took another turn. I could hear the faint clatter of utensils against the plates in a room beyond the hallway. This was it. Kazahana Dotō's dining room.

"I know. But it wouldn't be fair, would it? Anyway, we're here, now's your turn, Sharingan." I turned around and gave him a death glare (patented by the Uchiha).

"You call me 'Sharingan' one more time, I'm coming after you when I'm out of this goddamn country," I said that with a smile that I practised for diplomatic purposes. Although I would imagine that it probably looked very creepy with all the blood on me. "I am much more than my family's kekkei genkai." He just raised his hand and signalled me to the servant boy who was still oblivious.

I flickered in front of the boy in a fraction of a second, and before he could even say the word "Uchiha", the genjutsu was already taking effect. Slowly, he held out his wooden tray for me diligently. I took the tray and watched him walk away before reaching for that door left ajar.

Once again, I was back in the Snow Daimyo's presence. He was sitting at a long table, alone, isolated, with no one but two guards guarding the door at the other side. His back was facing me, therefore, he couldn't see my bloodied state. Unfortunately, his guards saw me; but fortunately, it was Kakashi's job to deal with them.

Me? I just slammed the wooden tray right on the Snow Daimyo's head.

It felt good when he fell down on the floor accompanied by a loud crash. Immediately, I threw away the tray and pulled out my swords. I aimed for his elbows because I couldn't kill him, yet, but I still need him to be as harmless as possible. Nobody said that he couldn't be handicapped.

My swords sliced through his clothes, but they bounced off his elbows with a 'ting'. _Right, his favourite chakra armour._ Just as I was about to grab for his neck, he punched me in the stomach. I didn't expect him to be that strong because that punch knocked me to the floor.

I rolled away just in time before his next fist could slam into my face, but before I got up, I managed to hook onto his arm and kicked his midriff with all I'd got. Eventually, he crashed into the table leg and somehow managed to collapse the long table. _Why couldn't he just be buried under all that rumbles?_ I lamented as I got up from the floor.

"What a joke, Uchiha girl. You can't use your prided genjutsu on me anymore, and without it, you are nothing but an arrogant and spoilt brat." Dotō mocked as he pushed away the rumbles and stood up to face me. Yeah, like I hadn't heard that before.

With an instant body flicker, I arrived behind him on a piece of the slanted table. He turned around immediately and swung his arm at my face. I dodged quickly, one of my hand latched onto his forearm while the other locked onto his elbow. He screamed loudly when I smashed his shoulder onto the table top and twisted his arm high up in the sky. The crunching sound of his shoulder joint startled the two guards and it wasn't long before they were taken out by Kakashi. However, I was quite aware that his scream - which was very undignified for a Daimyo - was definitely attracting all his guards, if the earlier sound of table crashing wasn't already doing so.

His other arm went by the same fate before I hauled him up by the collar of his armour and stuck the point of my tantō by his neck. Kakashi returned to my position and helped me got the Daimyo to his feet. By that time, the room was already filled with incoming waves of soldiers. They stopped in shock when they saw the sword by their Daimyo's throat and scrambled around with uncertainty.

"How's that for a 'brat'?" I spat out the words to the uncooperative Daimyo first before turning my attention to the crowds. "Move one weapon and your Daimyo is dead, with a sword through his neck." It went without saying that it effectively stopped their movements.

"Tell your soldiers to stand down, Daimyo-dono, we just want to go home. As long as you provide us with a passage home, we won't kill you." Kakashi said to the Daimyo, who grunted out some really unpleasant words before I had to press the blade closer.

"Is this your plan? How naive." Dotō mocked immediately and I scratched a thin red line on his neck.

"No need to be unpleasant, Daimyo-dono. Prepare a train to the harbour and let us get on a ship to the mainland, then we will be out of your hair forever. It only takes an hour, and you get to keep your life." I said to my hostage as a droplet of blood flowed down my blade.

"You wouldn't dare. If you kill me, it will start a war." _How ironic._ I could feel him shifting uncomfortably, opening his mouth and closing them nervously. He was afraid; very afraid of death.

"And you think that killing us will stop it? Believe us, Daimyo-dono, Konoha have no qualms _winning_ a war against your country. If the Uchiha Clan Head dies, Konoha will destroy Snow into pieces; you have no idea how important she is to our village. But if you escort her out of the country, you might just save your kingdom from a fate of destruction." When Kakashi said that speech to Dotō with the utmost seriousness, I had to resist the urge to snort. _Wow, I have no idea the village cares this much either. But as long as he believes it, let the magical words ring._ Some soldiers took a small step back from the circle. I could see from their paled faces that they were also afraid; very afraid of a war they couldn't win.

After ten excruciatingly long seconds, the Daimyo finally decided to order the guards: "Fine, you win this round. Guards, clear out a path to the train station and let our _guests_ go." Then he spat out to me: "I hope you both die in the ocean." I eyed him suspiciously as the soldiers slowly opened up a path for us to the door. _This feels … way too easy. Something is wrong here._

Maybe it was because of my paranoia, I saw his head moved away from the sword for just an inch and nodded in a motion so small that I doubt anyone would pay attention at this point. But I knew, with a gut instinct, that one of his soldiers saw.

Immediately I squatted down and pulled Kakashi down as well when a few kunai sailed over our head and landed on the wall. However, that feeling of something wrong didn't leave me, because the projectiles were thrown way too high for it to hit either of us. Instead, it looked as if they were meant to hit that tiny spot right under the ceilings.

 _Shit, they were trying to activate a trap._

I barely had the time to get rid of the baggage we called the Snow Daimyo and storm out of the nicely made path with Kakashi, before every freaking senbon in the world rained down on our exact position, making the whole ceiling looked like a giant reflective crystal.

"Catch them! Kill them! What are you waiting for!" I heard the Daimyo's frantic scream behind us, followed by legions of footsteps that shook this place like a mini-earthquake.

See, this was why I said that it was suicidal. One wrong move after we took him hostage, we would put ourselves in a really, really, _really_ bad position. Like this one, where we were stuck in a castle with every freaking guard alerted of our presence.

 _Should have knocked him out (or kill him) when I had the chance. Now we know one thing for sure: Kakashi and I would make for a terrible team of terrorists._

I ran as fast as I could because if I didn't, I would really die. All of a sudden, I felt my stomach twisting into knots because of Dotō's previous hit, and it made me stumbled for one step. That one step was all that it took for some guard to latch onto my arm and pull me back.

Ignoring the searing pain, I smashed my elbow into his side. _Ouch, that floating rib breaking off has got to hurt._ Then, I turned and kicked him in the neck, sending him tumbling down the corridor, blocking the path for the rest of the shinobis as well. When I turned around, Kakashi was already by the corner of this lane, waiting for me to catch up.

I ran to the corridor and turned right, despite having absolutely no idea where it would lead me. All I could do right now was to trust that at least one of us knew where we were going. Just as I turned the corner and disappeared out of our pursuer's line of sight, a door opened inward abruptly and someone pulled me in.

Imagine my surprise when I saw another Kakashi who shut the door when I clearly saw him running down the corridor like a tenth of a second ago. A clone, I suddenly realised when I heard the earthquake rumbling down the hallway, moving right past us to chase that fake target he had set up.

I stayed there for a while, sitting down by the door, pressing my back to the wooden panel, hearing my own urgent breaths, until the footsteps drew away and disappeared. I leant my head back onto the door and closed my eyes for a second because this might be the last moment of peace I would get before they started to check the rooms.

When I opened my eyes again, Kakashi was already peeking outside the shaded window. Reluctantly, I stood up and turned my attention to the door. I cut out a strip of fabric from my shirt and tied it around the door handles. The fabric for shinobi clothes was flexible and durable, so it was my hope that it would buy us some time before anyone could bust through the doors.

"How's the outside looking," I asked lightly, but with one grim look on his face, it was probably better if I didn't ask. So instead, I looked around the room. It was dusty, with rusted weapons and broken wooden panels everywhere. This room looked like it was supposed to be storing outdated weapons before it was replaced by mechanics. Shame, some of the kanatas would look pretty good if they were cared for properly.

Nonetheless, my attention was attracted to the single scroll in the midst of fragile weapons. It had that aura that clashed with the dreary atmosphere in the room like it was a beacon for something, good or bad. It was one of those days, where I had no choice but to say, screw this, I'm taking a chance.

I reached out for the paper scroll and pulled it out of the weapon piles, under Kakashi's suspicious eyes, I opened it and let the dust fell out. Underneath all that dirt and dust, I saw lines. Lots and lots of lines that didn't make sense.

"That's the array for a time-space transportation, well, at least the part that I can recognise." At some point, Kakashi appeared behind me and started to analyse the artifact from above my shoulder.

"The time-space transportation like your Mangekyou that sucks things into nowhere, or the kind like a reverse summon that will get us out of here?" The moment he heard the second part of my sentence, he immediately understood my intention. Then, he looked at me with that expression that just yelled out "Are you crazy?".

"A lot could go wrong, like everything. It might kill us; it might not work; it might land us back to where Dotō had his ambush. You don't mess with seals, especially with seals that you don't understand." He looked like he wanted to hit me on the head to see if my logic could be fixed. However, I didn't think that he get to say that when he practically just did the same thing a few hours ago.

Before I could answer, a loud crash on the door startled both of us. The strip of fabric prevented the door from being smashed open, but it was not going to last long.

"We don't have a choice. After all, no risk, no gain." That was all I said when the second crash sounded. I held up the opened scroll on my left hand and extended my right hand to him. He stayed silent for a second, but when the third crash thundered through the room, he finally took my hand.

We never heard the fourth crash, because as soon as I injected my own chakra in, the array lit up like a carved lantern. Then, a bright light engulfed us, illuminating the room until we couldn't see anything anymore.

Imagine my disappointment that when I opened my eyes again, I saw the same snow plain I was getting sick of seeing. The bad news was, we were still in the Land of Snow, but on the bright side, there were no stone castles in sight.

However, something was different, the snow was whiter, and the sky seemed brighter. If the scenery in the Land of Snow was greyed out by the industrial soot, then this was a pure snow world before all the technology had arrived.

Kakashi was beside me, looking just as stunned. _We were transported to… somewhere? Please don't tell me that we are suddenly at the south pole now. This just might push me over the edge and activate that gene for massacre tendency which the Konoha council keeps on insisting that I have._

' _Thud, thud, thud_ ' I heard footsteps, heavy, solemn ones that spoke of authority, and it wasn't long before I saw what exactly was making that sound.

A pack of wolves appeared, led by a huge pale grey wolf, dressed in some kind of armour akin to samurai. It wasn't really the footsteps that were loud, but rather the clinking of metal that spoke of authority.

Kakashi winced beside me and covered his face with a hand. This was not a good sign, Kakashi might complain, get angry, and ignore people, but when he winced, that meant things just became outrageously sketchy.

"How could I not recognise it? It's not a transportation scroll, it's a freaking summoning contract. This is where the summoning creatures live, and by the looks of it, they are not very friendly." True to his words, the wolves bore those shiny white teeth to us like we were their supper.

 _Crazy Daimyo, alcohol, chakra negating armours, and now, we have antagonistic summoning creatures. Why not, just add it to my itinerary for a day trip to the Winter Wonderland._

"Who dares to trespass our sacred land!" The leading wolf spoke in a deep, authoritative voice, behind him, there were all kinds of wolves, dark grey ones, white ones, large ones, small ones. They all looked very menacing and did not look very happy with the sight of humans.

"I came here through a scroll," I answered blandly since I had no other choice.

"Human, what do you want?" The Alpha asked again, with a lot of disdain in his voice.

 _What do I want? How about I tell you what I don't want. I don't want you to eat me; I don't want stay in the Land of Snow; I don't want to die…_ There were a million thoughts running in my head about how my day sucked. However, there was just that one tiny thought born out of the craziness that would have definitely slipped away if I had not decided to grab onto it.

"I want to go home. So please, I need your help."


	29. Chapter 29 - Requiem

A/N: I'm back! And this is so long... (I tried really hard to finish this arc before chapter 30, the result was a 10000-word chapter and a half-dead beta). A warning, some sections are not beta'd (my fault ... I changed the story plot after they beta'd the first version), so please excuse some grammar mistakes.

* * *

Chapter 29 - Requiem

"So you want us to fight for you?" The leading wolf said with an expression that could only be the wolf equivalent of raising an eyebrow. They had given me just enough time to explain the deep shit I was in before they had gone back to baring their teeth and eyeing us like the supper.

"Yes, but I don't expect you to do it for free." At this point, there was really no point in mincing the words. The wolf pack started to stir again, a few rustled uncomfortably and the others murmured in something I couldn't understand. The armoured wolf opened his jaw to say something, but before he could, the white wolf beside him whispered in his ears. As the summoning creatures discussed among their own, I just stood there motionlessly.

"You are honest, I'll give you that." This time, it was the white wolf who called out to me. "However, we don't trust words here, and our help doesn't come cheap. Step closer, human, let's discuss this." Warily, I took a step forward just as the White wolf trotted out of her pack, with three wolves trailing behind. Beside me, Kakashi also took a step, but his movement was interrupted quickly by the female wolf.

"No, I only want to talk to the girl. It's her price I'm asking, after all." Upon hearing her icy words, I turned around and give Kakashi a small nod. Hesitantly, he stopped moving and I continued to walk forwards. Instinctively, my grip tightened around the sword at my waist, and the white wolf's gaze flickered with amusement.

"What is it that you want?" I asked when we were only five metres apart. If she tried to lash out at me, you bet that she would meet my swords first.

"Just to see if you can pay the price." She said with such ambiguity that I couldn't understand her at first. But when the wolves disappeared from my line of sight faster than I could blink, I suddenly realised, they weren't trying to isolate me from the crowd, instead …

Immediately, I turned around with the metallic swords already draw out, but I was too late. Before any of us could react, three claws were already placed on Kakashi's neck, pressing onto his skin dangerously.

"I wouldn't do anything rash if I were you." The female wolf said as she walked around my Captain so casually that I wanted to stab a sword through her face. "Now that we have the price, let's discuss."

"Whatever you want, take it from me!" I almost growled the words out of my teeth, but I didn't dare to inch closer for the fear of causing an imminent death for Kakashi.

"We are bored here, being trapped in this land for decades, so we want to see some entertainment. Our rule is quite simple, entertain us, If you can't, then your friend here will die. I am waging our clan's welfare by considering to help you, therefore, I think you should do the same." That was not what I wanted. Getting others involved in my business, that was never my intention. Maybe my hands just trembled for a second, but I was sure that the cunning female wolf picked up the sign of a crack.

I had considered about rushing to Kakashi's aid, but another sentence from the female wolf completely dismissed that thought. "Don't even try, perhaps you should worry about your own safety. The show is starting, right behind you." She dared to say that with a smirk.

I felt a rush of the wind behind my head and immediately, I lowered my head just in time to dodge a claw that swung above my head. I twirled around and slashed my swords horizontally, only for them to bounce harmlessly off a set of armour. As I slid the sword across the wolf's chest plate, the friction produced a trail of sparks that forced him to jump a step back.

"You have fifteen minutes, I suggest your hurry. After fifteen minutes, I can't guarantee your friend's safety, nor yours." _And why don't you just shut up before I cut off your head?_ I didn't have time to curse at her because the grey wolf was circling slowly and I had to observe his muscle movement with everything spec of attention.

"You are unfortunate, to have caught Fuyuki's eyes. Perhaps I won't even need to use ninjutsu, then maybe you will last longer." The large grey wolf said bored as if he had just found a bug to crush. To be fair, I barely had enough chakra to keep the Sharingan running, let alone using ninjutsu.

Truly, there was nothing more insulting than your death being dismissed as a simple game.

Slowly, he crouched down in a battle stance and his armour clinked in harmony. Just for a moment, I closed my eyes and attempted to shut off the rage that had gone haywire just a second ago.

 _Take a breath, calm down, adjust your attention to the battle in front of you. Treat it as a mission, you need to eliminate your target and save your teammate._

At the corner of my eyes, I saw Kakashi's unmoving figure, still being held hostage by the trouble I had gotten him into.

 _Please, please let this work. Or god helps me, I will level this country if that's the last thing I do._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

It was quick thinking, Kakashi supposed. Decoy, backup, a summon could solve all those problems very nicely since they basically operated on an instant teleportation system.

However, the problem was, she was probably going to die. It wasn't very obvious seeing that the dance of blades and claws were still raging in front of him. But Kakashi knew that Maiko was going to lose if she continued at this rate.

In all aspect, she was tired, drained and injured before she even started the battle. He could see that unlike the wolf, she didn't pick the taijutsu approach by choice. The worst of all, Kakashi could see that the grey wolf hadn't been using his full strength. He had been slowly adding on to his speed and power at each hit, pushing Maiko to the limit and tiring her even more like this was some kind of entertainment.

The claws made sparks with the metal blades and those slim blades shook under the force. Kakashi wondered if her swords could even withstand that much power without breaking. As the sparks grew bigger, she ducked down to avoid the threatening jaws aiming for her head. It was always the same ordeal: Maiko's swords weren't sharp enough to cut deeper than a scratch, but the wolf's claw could easily tear open her body. It was only by the sheer speed that she had managed not to get ripped apart. Other than that, all she could do was block and run.

The saddest part was, Kakashi wasn't even sure what the hell happened that landed them in this sketchy situation.

"I don't buy it." He uttered, despite the fact that every book of survival told him to keep his silence when murder weapons were around his neck. "Your clan is too organised for them to be nothing but a bunch of violent brutes, and you look too smart to start a fight because of boredom." Kakashi addressed the white wolf who was pacing in front of him, and she turned around and face him with curiosity.

"You are a smart one, Shinobi." The female wolf as white as snow walked in front of him and she continued to explain. "Our clan originated from the Land of Snow, and despite the fact that we call it our home, we are forever trapped here, only able to step on the ice and snow. The only way for us to go to the outside world is through a human contractor. As much as we love it here, decades of boredom does entice some desire for the outside."

"But as the second in command for our clan, I need to make sure that the human whom we will give our lives to, deserves our trust." _And what does that have anything to do with killing each other?_ Kakashi wanted to ask, but it seemed like the wolf hadn't finished her speech yet.

"Fear not, Shinobi, we are not savages. I'm sorry we have to do this, but one can never be too careful in choosing their comrade. Even if she fails, we won't kill her and we will let you go, alive." Kakashi mentally sighed in relief, that was, until he heard the next sentence.

"I do see a lot of potential in her, so if she fails, we will simply keep her here and train her, until she is ready to contract us. I don't think she will object if we propose to trade your freedom for hers. After all, we don't get a lot of candidates around here." _Oh no, keeping her prisoner will only drive her crazy._ Besides, there was no way that Kakashi was willingly leaving a teammate behind in a foreign country, let alone one that had actively tried to kill them.

"What does she need to do in order to pass?" Kakashi asked as he turned his eyes to the white wolf. She had never for once explain the rules of her so called test. That, or Kakashi had missed the memo.

"One's fighting style can expose their personality and nature, especially in a situation where lives were on the line. Do you see that? How her strikes are so precisely balanced that they maximise efficiency and minimises the damage done to her." Reluctantly, Kakashi returned his gaze back to the battlefield. He wasn't sure if that was a compliment or not, but he had definitely wished so.

He was the one who taught her how to be an Anbu agent and it was really not nice to say that his pupil was not qualified. Of course, that was under the rule that she was being evaluated as an Anbu agent. Right now, even a blind man could see that this wasn't the case.

"From that alone, all I can see is a poor girl hanging onto nothing but survival. So let's hope that you can actually motivate her to have the gut to do something." Kakashi frowned at the wolf's words because he was completely lost as to what she was talking about.

"Anyway, we shall see, she still has some time. However, if she dares to kill anyone in our clan, I will personally guarantee both of your deaths." _And here is our problem._

From the five years Kakashi had known Maiko, one fact he could confidently say was that her default response to any threat was death because it was part of the job requirement.

However, this was a different kind of situation, where neither being killed or killing the opponent was an option. So he wondered for her and for himself, _is there a way out of this?_

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I was losing _very_ badly.

With the problems of injury, chakra exhaustion, and fatigue, the only thing I could do at the moment seemed to be running away. He was huge - twice my size. He was fast - pushing me to the point of having no time to breathe. My sword couldn't cut deeper than a few centimetres, but his claw could definitely rip in half. Every rule book about survival told me that I should run away, recover and find another way to engage the enemy.

But that was not an option because he had something I couldn't leave behind. So I was here, in this game of 'tag, you're dead', like a mouse caught in the cage with cats.

Wait, perhaps it was a rabbit who got caught in the wolf den. How ironic.

I didn't even have time to contemplate the theme of irony, seeing that I was slammed into the ground _again_. When I felt a shadow looming over me, I rolled away and one of his huge paws bashed down on the ground, creating a small crater where my head had been just a second ago.

The wolf eyed me arrogantly as he shook out the sword that was embedded shallowly in his skin like it was merely a useless piece of metal. Perhaps to him, it really was useless. Painfully, I stood up again, wiping the blood away from my face to get a clearer view.

Time was flying away as some imaginary clock made tic-toc to announce my doom. With no choice, I charged with only one sword in hand. I zig-zagged towards my target and aimed a blow at his neck. He reacted just in time to snap his jaws at me instead, but I managed to turn my sword right at that moment so that it pressed onto the metal armour over his nostril. Using that as a platform, I flipped over him and landed on his back. With all the strength I could gather, I punched him in the right eye.

Not going to lie, it felt good when he howled in pain, but that pride was short lived. Quickly, one of his claw came up, swinging towards my head and I ducked at the last moment. Like a child, I plastered my body onto his back, one of my hands wrapped halfway around his large neck and gripped his fur tightly while the other hand stabbed the sword as hard as I could into the back of his head. For any human, that was a killing blow. However, the hardness of his pelt was absolutely inhumane, and his general weak spots such as his throat and chest were protected by metallic armours.

The wolf rolled his body again and crashed onto his side. This time, I learned from my last mistake and pulled out the tantō, jumping off quickly before the right side of my body could be crushed. The jump was really not as elegant as a shinobi should be. The quick response tipped off my balance so I landed on my side instead of my feet. It was only by sheer luck that my fallen ninjatō was right next to where I. The wolf didn't even bother to kick the weapon away.

My stomach was throbbing in pain, and it certainly didn't help when the awkward landing reopened my wound. With each heartbeat pounding hard against my chest, I could feel a pulse of blood running down my hastily patched wound. I only stayed on the ground for a few seconds, but a small pool of blood was already gathering under my body.

"Are you going to continue this farce? Your attacks are not working." _Yes, I know that, thank you very much._ "Unless you can show me something other than this repetition, you are not qualified." _I am trying! Don't you think I know that? My teammate's life is in your hand, and I have no way of getting him out other than being forced to play your game. A game that waged a life that wasn't mine; a game that I am losing._

I thought the ice was supposed to slow the bleeding, but all it did was making the pain worse as ice shards grazed my wound. I could feel my own consciousness drifting, probably due to the loss of blood. I had to find a way to stop the bleeding, otherwise, I might as well just die of exsanguination before the wolf could tear me in half.

It was the worst timing ever, but who was I kidding? This whole trip in the land of snow was like some kind of déjà vu and this near death experience was bringing me closer and closer to the past. So as I reached out for my fallen blades and clutched onto them despite the stinging pain, the trip down the memory lane began …

 _I was born abandoned. No parents, no family, no future. I was simply not wanted in the legitimate world, so the dark side of the world took me. There is a philosophy that describes when a person is born, he/she is a blank slate. It's only the conditioning and the nurturing that determine their essence. OLYMPUS believed that, at least to some extent, so they proceeded to gather orphans and unwanted infants in any way they could. I was one of them._

 _OLYMPUS was not an orphanage, make no mistake. It was a battlefield. From the moment I was collected, the selection had begun. Infants die all the time if proper care is not given and OLYMPUS was not a babysitter either. I was one of those who survived, against the climate, against diseases and against the loneliness. This was a natural selection of some kind, a way for OLYMPUS to select those who had the ability to survive in the present because the future could only be worse._

 _I had no identity, I was simply 'that girl' or 'that brat' for the adults that guarded us. I had no birthday and I didn't have an age. However, from what others told me, I was close to five when my training started. For the first time in my life, I had an identity, even if it was just a number: 31._

" _Your everything belongs to us. Your body, your identity, your life and your future. You are what we make you and you are what we want you to be. Remember that you are nothing more than a tool that was built and designed to serve OLYMPUS. Only the useful tools will be kept, and the defective ones will be disposed of." That was the 'initiation' speech they gave us. The first warning of the life to come. A week after that, I was taught how to assemble and shoot a gun._

 _My hands moved fluidly around the components, picking out the recoil spring, the barrel and the slide. In precise motions, I attached them together with the main frame, hearing the clicking of parts when they fitted perfectly together. Finally, I inserted the magazine from the bottom of the handle and pulled the slide back in preparation for the shots._

 _However, before I could pull the trigger, six shots sounded in succession at the station next to mine. My own shots quickly followed, marking bullet holes on the dummy fifteen metres in front of us._

 _I looked at the positions of the holes on my own dummy. Four were dead on while the other two were slightly off. Then I looked at the dummy beside mine. All six hit the centres of the small circles marked on the dummy. I was not good enough._

 _Soon, the training facility was filled with the bangs of gunshots as my fellow trainees finally finished assembling and firing their own guns. The evaluator eyed the line of dummies and wrote something down on the chart._

" _31, your accuracy needs work. Fix it." The evaluator said without lifting his eyes, but I still dipped my head to show that I understood my position. "32, you took three seconds longer than your record time today. Fix it." Subtly, I eyed the brown haired boy next to me, who also dipped his head down just like me. For a quick second, I thought I saw something that shouldn't exist here: resentment._

" _Everyone else needs to decrease their assembling time by five seconds before the end of the week. Am I clear?"_

" _Yes, Sir!" We spoke like a well-trained choir because we all understood the meaning behind those words. We either reached the standard or we were useless. For the rest of the day, we continued to practice. Round after round. The boy next to me would always assemble the gun quicker and fire them more accurately. He was my partner for training, 31 and 32._

 _He was always better than me in dealing with guns. So why was it that I was the one who survived in the end?_

 _When I was around seven, my trainee days were over. The final evaluation was very straightforward, so befitting of the style of selection in OLYMPUS: a dual to the death between training partners. 31 and 32 went into the survival arena at the same time. 31 put a bullet through 32's heart. It didn't matter what happened in between because I honestly couldn't remember. 31 came out alive, but 32 didn't. From that moment, 31 became 'Operative 31'._

 _For the next seven years, I lived in the same monotone lifestyle. I always felt the guilt for what I did, but I never failed to push the guilt down when the next mission came around. Maybe the number coding was supposed to dehumanise us, so we would feel like machines rather than humans. Operatives came and go, but somehow, I remained alive. It was not until when I was about thirteen that my identity changed again._

' _I don't want to die. I want to live.' That was the belief that made me endure the rounds of beatings and interrogations. Eventually, they left me alone and I started to get rid of the ropes. It was stupid, how long it took me to wriggle out of bindings. When the next time that masked man came around, my body just flew into motion before I even thought about it._

 _I kicked his knee with sharp force and watched him stumble, then I swiped my leg against his. As he hit the floor with a 'thud', his hands reached for the gun tucked in at his belt. I couldn't let him do that, so I found the only thing available in this room: the chair they had bound me in._

 _It was an impulsive action, I did it without much reasoning but rather relied on my survival instinct. I grabbed the rusted metal chair as the man temporarily laid on the floor. Then, I aimed one of the dull chair legs at his throat and thrust it down. All that was left was the sound of the man silently choking as blood leaked out of the hole in his neck._

 _Eventually, he stopped the spasms and the pool of the blood spread out on the floor, with his throat as the centre point. After an awfully long moment of stillness, I pulled the chair leg out. I supposed that there was a bit of curiosity that drove me to bend down and remove his blood soaked mask._

 _I was dumbfounded when I saw his face. I knew him; he was one of the operatives in the organisation with only a number to identify himself, just like me. I was confused. So confused. Suddenly, I realised how ludicrous and absurd the situation was. What was I supposed to do? I killed someone I shouldn't. This time, killing the others wouldn't save me._

 _In fact, I was so confused, I sat back on the chair I had just used as a murder weapon and slumped my body in exhaustion. I was even more confused when 'Hecate' came in, not to reprimand me, but to promote me._

 _I had another codename. 'Artemis'. I was 'upgraded' from the dehumanising number system, but I had no idea why. What did they want from me? What did they want me to do? Obviously, just doing my job wasn't good enough. That agent was just doing his assignment when he 'kidnapped' us for the evaluation. But in the end, he still died. So tell me, what do I need to do to survive?_

 _I never found the answer to that, simply because I didn't survive in the end. I died. Sent on a suicide mission by the organisation I was forced to devote my life to. I died, and I had no idea why._

But now, I needed that answer, because I didn't want what happened last time to repeat ever again.

 _Memory is knowledge and knowledge is power,_ I chanted silently as I finally pushed myself up from the ground. My opponent was giving me time to recover, and I couldn't believe how long it took me to realise this: This was never about the outcome, this was a presentation. And Kakashi, he was just the incentive to keep me in this game longer.

Under the wolf's watchful gaze, I gathered the last bits of my chakra and forced them into fire natured chakra. With a light snap, a small spark of flame danced on my fingertips only for a second as it burned my wound with precision. It sure hurt like hell, smelling your own flesh burn. I was sure there were whimpering and gagging sounds, but I refused to scream. The bleeding had stopped, but the pain worsened. My Sharingan had died, but I didn't.

Shun had mentioned that there was a block - a foreign object as he liked to call it - that seemed to forbid him from accessing my mind completely, maybe it was doing the same to me as well. Just like how Sasuke wasn't able to re-activate his sharingan until recently unless he opened that 'block' in his heart, maybe it was the same with me. For better or worse, all I needed was to unravel my mind.

 _Give me back my memories. I need them to keep me sane._

It was almost like a click. The moment that it was decided, the block just unravelled itself spontaneously, as if it was always just a part of me that was always eager to return.

 _Memories. Not a lot of them, just for two events really, but they were all I needed._ Now that everything was out, I guess my natural defence against mind invaders wouldn't work anymore. _Shun would definitely exploit this opportunity to repay every time he was 'booted' out of my mind during our childhood, got to keep this bits of news away from him._

" _I said, kill me! It's the only way that I will get out of this hellhole!"_ I did what you asked, 32, and from then on, I just couldn't stop following the orders.

" _Sophia Crowford."_ That was one of my many insignificant names - the start of my demise.

" _You know the rules."_ I did. But now that I thought about it, I should have just thrown it out of the window. Because in the end, it was a set of rigged rules that got me killed. OLYMPUS wrote the rules, and they broke it when it was convenient. I was just one of the pawns that never got the memo.

I'd like to say that it was just the adrenaline, but really, after so long in this world, I couldn't believe that I was actually making sense of what was happening here. Memory was power here, literally. It could exist in the form of yin-chakra - the thing that we Uchihas were so good at.

You see, I had this mental map in my head: A tumour sized block had just erupted in my brain like an aneurysm. With the memories, came a torrent of yin-chakra that had nowhere else to go. Therefore, they rushed to the nearest beacon - my swords, Hyakkiyakō and Senbonzakura, forged by my Uchiha ancestors who had nothing better to do than playing with yin-chakra.

The result was a pair of swords coated with highly concentrated yin-chakra. People often coated their weapons with chakra, hell, I had done the same with lightning natured chakra once upon a time, before I was drafted into covert missions where there couldn't be any flashy sparks. However, I had never tried with yin-chakra before, because unlike elemental natured chakra, yin had to be balanced with yang. But you know, I'm weird. Now that my Sharingans were shut down, this weird thing that had just happened to me might actually give me a chance to do something even weirder.

I didn't really have time to thoroughly plan out anything because when I looked up again, my opponent wolf was already charging towards me at full speed as if he had sensed the danger of unknown. With a fluid motion, I ducked under his giant claw and spun my twin swords like a windmill. To my surprise, and probably to his as well, my first sword - the ninjatō made a deep gash on his exposed stomach, cutting deeper into the flesh than I had ever been able to before. Unlike before, where the wolf had just shrugged off the scratched and continued with his attack, he actually jumped back at an alarming speed and pushed away my tantō, making another spark of light.

 _Please tell me it hurts, I really need to know that._ I might actually be able to kill him, now that he had to take my attacks seriously. But no, I wasn't actually planning to kill anyone, because I had a feeling that it would just make things worse.

When the wolf charged again, I realised, much to my dismay, that my vision was tunnelled. I could only see the storm of grey in front of me as I parried and blocked, with no extra attention to spare. I wrestled with the wolf as I kicked his limb, then we crashed on the ground together. I could see the familiar mass of grey looming over me, but I was already rolling away under his claws, not forgetting to add another scarlet red slash on his leg, missing the joint by just an inch.

However, before I could get up, something strong clamped one of my arms onto the ice painfully. Without hesitation, I changed the grip on my tantō and stabbed the wolf claw on my arm. Immediately, it retracted, but only for it to clamp onto my sword instead, pinning the shorter blade onto the ground.

I was awfully calm when his other claw came swooshing down towards my throat. My guess, those 'scratches' really hurt. Normally, I supposed that I should block it, or abandon my tantō in an attempt to get away. But no, not this time. Instead, I forced my eyes open and tried to ignore that large sharp claw which could result in a pretty bloody image for me. Then, I raised my ninjatō and pushed the silver blade forward, aiming right at his right eye.

Then, everything stopped. The claw was an inch away from my neck and my ninjatō stopped just above his right eye, hovering less than an inch above the pupil. If he dared to shift his claw so much as for a twitch, I was confident that I could pierce his brain through the eye. And the same thing applied to me.

"Let him go, or I will stab your brain out through your eye," I said to the wolf coldly. Honestly, this trip to the Land of Snow was all about threats. The wolf knew I could do it. Now that my blade was enhanced with chakra, it was lighter, faster, and way more deadly.

"I can kill you with a single touch, or are you forgetting something?" The wolf shouted back immediately. His claw was dangling very close to my skin, how could I forget that?

"You treasure your life, but at the moment, I don't. You want to live; I want my friend's safety. Either we all go down, or we all get what we want, your choice." My voice trembled slightly due to the fatigue, but my hand was very steady in keeping that blade above his eye. _You don't make the rules here, not anymore._

"I believe both of you can let go now." Our deadlock was interrupted by the voice of that female wolf who spoke up before - she should have just kept her silence because now I wanted to kill her. "Please, let go." She ordered me again, this time harsher, seeing that none of us moved an inch.

"I am not the problem. It's her who wouldn't give up." The large wolf growled in displeasure, but I just snorted in contempt.

"Let my friend go first, and then we can _discuss_ this." I could hear the low growl sound the wolves made in frustration. They started it first, it would be impolite of me not to respond the favour.

"I have already let him go. We never meant to hurt him, it's just a test." When I heard the female wolf's voice again, I wanted to laugh out of the spite.

"Easy for your to say," I yelled back, still unable to move my eyes from the wolf and the blade in front of me. If I lost focus for a second, I would lose all my bargaining chips.

"It's okay, Maiko. You can put your blade down." And just like that, my determination faltered. _Really, Kakashi, they put claws on your neck, and now you are their spokesperson? What happened to all my effort?_

"Fine, show me you that you mean it. Back away, and trust that I won't slice your brain open." I turned my attention back to the wolf in front of me, who looked like he wanted to do anything other than being here with me. _Oh, the feeling is mutual._ Reluctantly, he retracted his claws and moved a few step back, all the while eyeing my glowing swords with distaste and caution.

When the wolf was considerably away from me, I managed to turn my face just a bit to see that Kakashi alive and well, _without_ those blasted claws anywhere near him. Then, all the energy just kind of disappeared.

I dropped my swords all of the sudden and they hit the ground with two 'clinks'. The silvery glow lingered for a few seconds before they swirled into the carvings on the base of the blades and disappeared. On the other hand, now that the adrenaline was gone, that badly burned patch of skin on my stomach was giving me a hell of a time.

"Looks like you figured out how to coat weapons with yin-chakra. Impressive." _Remind me again why is she still speaking?_ I thought as I laid on the ground, trying to push the wrenching pain away.

"Yeah, no thanks to you." I wanted to lay a little longer, maybe the ice was helping the burn (probably not). But before I could close my eyes, I saw Kakashi's unimpressive face as he loomed over me. _Got it, I made this mess, I fix it._

"So much attitude, but I guess that you have a right to. We just want to make sure that you have the qualities we are looking for." I sat up slowly and forced myself to look at the white wolf as she continued to speak. "Not quite how I imagined it, but let's just say that you pleasantly surprised us. Therefore, we will help you, on the condition that you bring us out to the world outside of this land through a contract."

I raised an eyebrow at her incredulously, now that was what I would call an attitude change. I turned my face to Kakashi next and silently asked 'Do I have to do this?'. It wasn't really a surprise when the answer I got was 'yes'.

"Fine, but if you pull that one more time―"

"It won't happen again. Once we put our faith in you, we don't waver. The contract binds us to never harm you, and the same applies to you. Do you accept?" She was the first one to cut off a threat during my whole trip in this country. If I wasn't so pissed at her at the moment, I might actually like her.

"Your name," She asked as she unfolded a scroll in front of me.

"Uchiha Maiko," I answered while putting back my fallen swords back to their holsters.

"My name is Fuyuki," the white wolf introduced herself as I signed my name in blood. After I had done that, she rolled the scroll back and with a poof, it was gone. "I can send you back to the Land of Snow, but only two hundred metres from the point which you had entered. Call me when you need me, I believe that you will find me very useful." _Why do I have a feeling that I was being sold into something?_

"So, the young one and the smart one, you have a place you want to be?" Fuyuki asked, but in my mind, it all sounded like she was either mocking me or threatening me. Besides, what kind of naming system was that and why did he get to be 'the smart one'? On the note of the actual question, anywhere but the castle.

It seemed that Kakashi and the she-wolf had reached an agreement just when I was hit by another wave of exhaustion. I wanted to lie down again and let the ice numb me, but before I could do that, I felt a wolf claw on my shoulder. I didn't get a chance to cut that limb off because the next thing I knew, we were back at the ice cave again and that infuriating she-wolf was nowhere in sight.

"Where the hell have you two been? None of the ninkens could find you." The first thing that greeted us were Pakkun's slightly rageful words. With a sigh, I chose to ignore him and sat back on the cold, hard floor.

"Never mind that, what's the situation at the border?" Kakashi said quickly.

"Like you suspected, the harbour is thickly surrounded. Although there will be two major trading vessels from the Fire Country docking five hours from now. Both of the vessels are the official shipments from the Daimyo, one of them will be landing on the southern side and the other one, the eastern side." Pakkun illustrated the situation for us meticulously. This was good news, as long as we could get on a vessel, we would have a way home.

"Keep patrolling for any signs of enemies around here, we will execute our escape plan in five hours." Like a gust of wind, Pakkun took off again. Then, he turned his attention to me like he was studying a species that he couldn't understand. He took a breath in preparation to say something, but then, all that came out was a sigh.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." He didn't have to say anything because as soon as we were alone, everything about me broke apart. "I am so sorry that I got you into this. I didn't mean to … If I had known this would happen, I would never have opened that scroll. No, I shouldn't have open that scroll in the first place …"

The guilt just wouldn't stop running. Perhaps it was because I had just gained some memories about my past life, and all of them were filled with guilt and remorse. The guilt just wouldn't stop flooding, so in all defence, I just closed my eyes.

I had just realised something. It wasn't death that I was most afraid of - it was death for no purpose, not just mine, but other's as well. And the worst kind? Making others pay for my mistake.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." I chanted that phrase repeatedly as if it made everything better. The cave was silent, so silent that I could only hear the wind howling in the background of my own inaudible chant.

"Open your eyes. You can't hide your way out of everything, you need to face it." _He always has a point, doesn't he?_ Hesitantly, I opened my eyes.

"First of all, it's not your fault. What was that phrase again?" He sat down in front of me and rubbed his chin like he was really trying to think of something. "Right, 'it's not my fault, the Daimyo is just crazy'. If there was one thing that I agree with on this bloody mission, that's probably it."

"If you really want to apologise, you can write the mission report when we get back. With everything that happened, I'm not keen on trying to explain them to the Hokage. With that said, I do hope that you can distinct between recklessness and bravery in future circumstances, because the next time, we may not be this lucky again." Ah, there it was, the lecture. It was moments like these that he actually felt like a teacher.

"You know, I fully expect you to get me out of here, just that this time, I want to be alive, and so do you." That stopped the guilt, I supposed. For a second, I wondered if his charisma as a Captain was naturally born. I wasn't going to lie, I found comfort in associating with him because I admired him as the person whom I had always wanted to become. And with this second chance in life, I could.

"So, what's our escape plan? I'm all ears." I asked lightly, trying to clear the cracking sound in my voice. Emotions came and went like storms, but for some, there was no point in dwelling on them. There were longer lasting ones that one should hold on to.

"How do you feel about making some goddamn fireworks?"

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Why do I have to get her?" I asked with irritation as we crouched low on the roof of the train while it was still speeding fifty miles per hour. The escape plan started with the disguise. We jumped on a train, took two Snow shinobis out in mere seconds and dumped their body in the snowy land. As Kakashi and I changed into those two unlucky men using a transformation jutsu, Kakashi's ninken pack buried the bodies in a pile of snow.

The problem was, this disguise could only last for so long, and before the train would arrive at the harbour station and we could be exposed by a routine guard rotation check, we had to get some new disguises.

"She volunteered to help you, and she lowered your chakra cost for summoning by compensating it with her own share. Now that you've signed your soul away with the contract, you might as well learn to trust her." _Look who's found his sense of humour?_ I rolled my eyes at him as I stabbed my blade through the metal roof and cut out a square. With the yin-chakra enhancement stored in my swords, the blades could actually cut normal metals like butter. Too bad that it was still chakra and therefore, would definitely be ineffective against the armours.

"Seriously? She puts claws around your neck just five hours ago, and now you are her public relations officer. Whose side are you on?" I shot back as I removed the piece of metal. He just sighed as he dropped down into the cargo room with me trailing behind. We were currently in a segment full of shipment meant for the Fire country. In a little less than five minutes, these goods would be carried onto that vessel on the Eastern shore, which would head straight for the mainland.

"We are all supposed to be on the same side." He responded with exasperation as I tiled the roof back to its position with my sword. Then, with a quick hand seal, a small stream of fire shot out of his mouth and the heat welded the metals back together. There, as good as new, under the dim light, nobody would see the difference.

"Uh-huh, let's believe that when she actually gives me a reason to," I said absent-mindedly as I peeked outside of the small window. Even from here, I could see the sea of soldiers crowding the harbour, making the view of the vast blue sea nearly impossible to find.

After the brief look, I returned my gaze to the cargo room. Crates of something was stacked in the room, with only a small aisle for passage. Somehow, Kakashi managed to rearrange the boxes in a way that it looked more or less the same on the outside, but with a small slit behind one of the crates at the back. He disappeared behind the crate, and with no other choice, I crawled in as well.

As the train continued to move, the cart shook slightly at each turn and bump. During another turn, the crates in front of us started to shift and the one on the top looked dangerously close to falling down. Instinctively, I raised my hand to stop it, only to flinch back in pain when the scalding wound on my stomach was strained too quickly. The crate never fell down, because Kakashi reached up just in time to push it back in its place.

"I'll say this again. Cauterisation, really?" He said to me in a monotone voice, but that disapproval in his voice was hard to miss.

"And I'll answer you again. It's either fire or ice, I didn't exactly have the time to stitch it up all nice and pretty." With one look from him, I knew that his next question would be 'why not ice?'.

"I'm an Uchiha, we would choose fire over ice any day." He rolled his eye at my snarky response. When we were in this banal place, there was nothing better to do than making sarcastic comments.

"So you are telling me that you would rather burn on a stick rather than freeze in a cave, because of genetic reasons?" See, he knew when to go with the flow. Frankly, I would prefer not to die at all, but I still nodded with all the seriousness I could muster. The moment that we fell silent again, the train started to slow down. Here we were, the harbour.

The plan was already in motion the moment the train door was pulled open by Fire Country workers. To put it simply, it was a mash-up of everything we could find: decoy, disguise, frontal assault, fireworks. We made sure that every failsafe was in place, and it was only a matter of figuring out when to switch from plan A to plan B.

"Get the shipment loaded, people! The ship will be leaving soon, so if you want your payment, you better work fast." I heard a yell from outside the train, no doubt from the one in charge of the shipping. It was a good thing that the Land of Snow required every bit of crop traded from inland because of its harsh conditions, it was the only guarantee we had that the Daimyo wouldn't seal off the harbour completely.

One by one, the crates stacked in front of us were removed, and when there were only a few left, I heard loud yells from the outside. Then, there was a rush of footsteps along with the clinks of armours.

"Fugitives sighted!" " Move out, check for decoys!" I could make out some faint sentences in the rush of Snow army just as one of the Fire Country workers carried off the second to the last box in front of us. He was distracted from the yells, but he only stared at the direction where the commotion started for a few seconds to satisfy his curiosity before he turned his attention back to work. For civilians, it was always the safe choice to leave shinobi businesses alone.

That one moment of distraction was all I needed to cast a genjutsu on him. Right now, both Kakashi and I were in another transformation jutsu to mimic the workers for the ship. I was sure that it would break the moment a Snow shinobi with the chakra negating armour touched us, but for the civilian, the combination of genjutsu and transformation jutsu was more than enough to fool them.

'What are you two still doing here? Start working before the ship leaves!" The man yelled at us harshly before carrying his own crate off of the train. Obediently, we started to carry that one last crate down the platform and headed for the ship.

As we walked, some shinobis ran past us, and for the sake of acting my part, I glanced back and feigned that curiosity despite the fact that I had already known what was going on. They had just discovered our clones - decoy number one.

See, the decoy was only about a hundred metres behind us, and they were highly unreliable because they were just lighting clones. The moment I turned my head, I saw my own clone being popped by an incoming kunai, releasing a stream of wild electricity that did absolutely nothing against the armours.

"They are decoys! Deploy the army to the other ship!" I heard a shout just as Kakashi urged me to keep up with the facade. _Took you long enough._ I thought as we inched closer to the ocean. There was still a thick defence line in front of the ship, including a carefully sealed checkpoint towards the boarding entrance, but some defence was already being transferred to the direction of the other ship docked at the southern harbour.

Of course, what speed up the process was the fact that some attack were occurring at the southern site - including some avalanches and screams.

With some squinting in my eyes, I could make out a faint white figure standing on top of a snowy cliff, shaving off some ice and rocks and shook them off as they rolled downhill straight into the snow Army. Kakashi's shadow clone was also near the front line, cutting off people's neck so swiftly that they couldn't even figure out how to response at the beginning. The Southern harbour had the perfect hill for an ambush, and that was why it made for a convincing performance.

"Sir! Our army is thinning on the other side, should we deploy for more?" As we headed towards the checkpoint, I heard an older soldier, probably higher in the ranks, being debriefed. He scanned his eyes across the Southern field, before returning his gaze to the ship in front of him. I didn't react at all when his critical gaze ran over me. It lingered for a second before the shinobi finally responded to the messenger.

"Deploy another hundred over, but tell the remaining force to stay put and examine everything that passes through the checkpoint. I want every worker, every crate searched for any sign of ninjutsu or foreign shinobi." I was afraid that he was going to say that, but hey, we had expected that and prepared for it.

Originally, there were around four hundred soldiers manning each ship to the Fire Country, along with another two hundred scattering around them acting as a mobile patrol force. However, with the actual, physical attack on the southern ship, the two hundred patrol was already gathering around there along with the hundred some deployed from this side earlier. With another hundred away, that meant for a short window of time, we only had to deal with a little more than two hundred soldiers, a huge improvement considering the situation.

The exact moment when our plan turned from A - decoy and disguise, to B - kill everybody standing in the way, was quite unclear. But all I knew was, when the shinobi at the checkpoint touched me and the disguise dispelled, I had already made an incision across his throat. From that point on, everything happened in a daze. In less than a few seconds, Kakashi's shadow clone dissipated to his annoyance, and I summoned Fuyuki from the other side of the harbour to my annoyance.

I elbowed one of the shinobi in the stomach and flipped him to the ground, face down. Before I had the chance to stab a hole in his neck, a row of earth spikes broke the ice and erupted from the ground. One of them impaled that Snow shinobi's neck while the others formed a thick layer of thorns in front of me, only for it to shatter a moment later from the torrent of projectiles that had embedded themselves in the rocks.

I barely had the time to turn and see the smirk on Fuyuki's face before another shinobi charged at me. I swore I rolled my eyes in irritation as I swept the enemy off of his feet, kneed him in the spine as he fell harshly on ground, and actually slashed his neck open.

"The ship! They are forcing the ship to stay!" I managed to yell at Kakashi as he flipped someone over his head and plunged a kunai in his eye. Brutal, but effective. He glanced over at the Fire Country Vessel, realising as well that there were some workers trying to argue with Snow shinobis who were probably trying to cut off our only escape route. So now, entered the plan C - actually getting on a moving ship.

"Go, I'll―we will hold them off here," I said to Kakashi, only changing the pronoun when I felt the heated glare from the white wolf. My captain nodded immediately, at this point, we all knew our parts. Kakashi would secure the ride; Fuyuki would be the decoy, the backup, and the bodyguard depending on the situation; and I had been saving my chakra all day for this.

 _I was promised some fireworks, so let it burn._

Kakashi flickered to the ship immediately, storming through the unprepared guards who clearly hadn't thought of the possibility that he would leave me behind. With a few well-placed taijutsu attacks, he flung them back to the wooden board connecting the ship deck to the harbour as the ship workers on the ship stepped back in fear.

Then, the black flames burned.

He sent a jolt of jagged electricity across the wooden board as Amaterasu continued to rage on. With one kick, the connection between the harbour and the ship was broken.

I willed the black flame to engulf those shinobis that Kakashi had left on the wooden board. The flame dimmed a bit as it moved across each shinobi, probably the effect of the chakra negating armours. It was giving me a splitting headache trying to resupply the chakra constantly.

A few more earth walls and ice walls arose from the ground as I tried to expand the Amaterasu until it could form a firm line in front of me, separating us and the ship from the Snow shinobi. See, this plan wouldn't have worked if we only had two people, because I would have probably been killed multiple times before I could form that impenetrable line of all-consuming fire.

It was Fuyuki who used her sharp claws to kill those shinobis that my fire couldn't reach in time; it was also her defensive ninjutsu that prevented the sharp metals in the air from killing me.

"I told you that you will find me very helpful." She smugly reminded me as she trotted by my side, lifting up walls to hold off the kunais and shurikens. They were shattered into pieces every time a new round of volley cannons fire, but she was making them faster than I could.

"Careful, you are obstructing my vision." I ducked as she made another wall that rose in front of me and curved over my head. The wall shattered almost immediately and I rolled away from the fallen debris, desperately trying to keep that line of black flames in sight.

Just because our enemies couldn't get through my Mangekyou, didn't mean that they didn't try. Every time someone tried to jump over my flame, I had to increase the height. Like an actual firework shooting from the ground, the shinobi got incinerated into nothingness. The feeling wasn't great when my hard earned chakra was sucked into oblivion every time they tried to cross Amaterasu. Blood was already filling up my right eye, dripping down my cheek like a mini waterfall. At this rate, I wouldn't even have enough chakra to water-walk to the ship.

"Oops, we would have to work on that, wouldn't we?" She answered cheerfully. _Why is she so happy?_ Perhaps, it was because that she would finally be able to see the world outside of the ocean, and she was the first one in her clan to be able to do so in a very long time.

"You better get going, the ship is already more than fifty metres away from the shore and it's speeding away at every second." I didn't have the attention to check on the ship. I tried to raise the flames one more time to block another shinobi with a death wish, only to have the horrifying realisation that I couldn't. My chakra was drained, again, for the third time in this stupidly hostile territory. So instead, I drew my sword and blocked the shinobi at the last second to prevent an imminent death, before Fuyuki could cleave off his neck with her claws.

"You ran out of chakra, didn't you?" She said as she shook her head at me in mock pity. _Well, don't just mock me, it's pretty obvious that the fireworks are over._ "Well, get on, I'll carry you there. Personally, I can't wait to get in the ocean." _For once, we agree on something._ Without any hesitation, I climbed onto Fuyuki's furry back as the black flame behind me diminished rapidly.

"Maybe with this, we are even," I whispered into the she-wolf's ear as she sprinted across the water with showers of projectiles raining behind us, and she returned my peace offering with a laugh.

"We will grow on each other, I'm sure," She said confidently. When we were only ten metres from the speeding vessel, a patch of ice appeared under her paws. Using it as a platform, Fuyuki contracted her legs and leapt up violently. Like an arrow, she shot up into the sky, making a beautiful arching trajectory above the ocean.

With a loud 'thud', she landed on the deck just barely, much to the civilians' horror. Meanwhile, I had to grab onto Fuyuki's fur to prevent myself from crashing onto the deck.

Slowly, as if parading in pride, she turned to face the shore. The firework had long disappeared, but I watched crowds of soldiers standing along the shore in horror, witnessing our grand escape without the ability to stop us.

They couldn't stop us, if they so much as to put one shuriken on this ship, they would be openly declaring war against the entire Fire Country. But just because the Fire Country might give the Land of Snow a pass didn't mean Konoha was going to provide the same treatment, because we were still alive to tell the tale.

 _Bye bye, Land of Snow, let's see how you get out of this one._

* * *

A/N: Kakashi and ninkens: relationship goals. Maiko and Fuyuki: what happens when the relationship starts with a threat followed by another and some more (and this is a positive version ...)


	30. Chapter 30 - Miracle

Beta'd by Alice J.

* * *

Chapter 30 - Night-Blooming Cereus (Part 2 - Miracle)

"Stop laughing, it's not even that funny," I said in exasperation as I tried to place the dressing all nice and neat over the burnt skin. Yet the white wolf who sprawled over my bed was still grinning uncontrollably.

"My apologies, it's just that the fact you are 'Rabbit' and that you contracted us, the wolves, sounds really …" Before she could even finish the sentence, she bursted out in another set of laughter.

I groaned rather loudly, one because of the annoying laughter from the wolf; two because every time I tried to adjust the dressing, it sent ripples of pain down my stomach. How I wished that Zebra was here right now. Any one of his simple healing jutsus would be better than my moronic action of dumping antiseptic on the wound.

Droplets of water fell rhythmically onto the wooden floor from my wet hair. They rested over my shoulders, curling slightly because of how rough I dried it with a towel, trying to get the blood out. The people on this ship were nice enough to give us each a room and a passage home, and that included a large bucket of water to clean my wounds and wash off the blood that painted over more than half of my body.

Sure, they had been scared out of their mind when we first jumped on board a large wolf in toll, all drenched in blood. However, after we had shown them our identities from Konohagakure and explained our situation, they were more than willing to allow us to stay on board.

"I wasn't the one who chose it. Also, if the word you are looking for is 'ironic', then that's probably the right word for every phase of my life." I said in a monotone voice as Fuyuki let out another howl, full of mirth.

"Well, shall I call you 'little rabbit' now? It's rather cute, don't you think?" She teased, wagging her fluffy tail excitedly. No, I did not think it was cute, so I sent her a baleful glare to confirm my point.

When I realised that the roll of dressing tape ran out before I could actually finish taping the wound, I cursed and turned around to find another roll of tape amongst the disorganised trinkets scattered all over the small bed.

"Why are you still here? My chakra is mostly gone, so how are you still here?" As I fished out the roll of tape under some stitching threads, I asked the wolf who was currently admiring the ocean. I didn't mean to sound unappreciative, I was simply curious.

"Ah, you see, I can last for a bit with my own chakra. But your chakra is building up, so you don't mind if I syphon a bit away, do you?" I could feel black lines forming on my forehead as she sprouted each word without an ounce of guilt. The only reason why I was not lashing out again was because she had helpfully cut the tapes into pieces with her sharp claw, saving me the trouble of doing it myself.

"Let's go over the clause again―" For the third time, she repeated the same phrase. This time, I was already starting to recite the words before she could finish the sentence.

"I need to summon you at least once a week for the pure purpose of educating the youngsters of the outside worlds. There are also additional training sessions with either you or that armoured wolf twice per week. My maximum summoning limit right now is one creature at a time …" Absentmindedly, I recited the agreements as I finally secured the dressings. It was a really rushed effort and I had no doubt I would get scolded by Zebra for the low-quality job.

As Fuyuki nodded in satisfaction, I looked around for my shirt that got flung somewhere in the room for the sake of convenience. Helpfully, the wolf picked up the black fabric with her claw and threw it at me. Although it was only after I had put it on, I realised that there was a tear down the side, obviously from the wolf's claw. I gave my summon an accusing look, but all I got in return was more of her wagging tail.

"The Land of Snow had changed so much over the years. The snow, they are not white anymore. Instead, they are grey and dirtied. What happened?" Fuyuki asked in a sad tone as she stared out of the window. The Land of Snow was long gone from the horizon, but I knew for sure that she was eyeing the direction of her homeland.

"Kazahana Dōto, he started the industrial revolution," I answered, and she frowned slightly at the mention of the Snow Daimyo.

"Kazahana, you say?" She paused a bit like she was pondering something. "Our clan used to have many generations of contractors of that name hundreds of years ago. But one day, they stopped, and our clan had never seen another human again until you came." Suddenly, I thought back to the sad state of the summoning scroll back when I had found it in the castle, old, forgotten, and full of dust. I didn't want to tell her that, so I just swept the things on the bed aside and flopped down ungracefully, hoping to actually catch some sleep.

"There's no need to rush, but please, tell me more about your village. I know nothing about you, and it would be important for my clan to get familiarised with you if we were to work well together." Even without opening my eyes, I could feel her head looming over mine, urging me to answer. _Umm…what happened to 'there is no need to rush'?_ Very unwillingly, I opened my eyes and the curious glint in her eyes hinted that I wouldn't be able to sleep anytime soon.

"Konohagakure no Sato is in the fire country, so it's quite warm most of the time. It rarely snows, even in the winter." The first sentence came out quite easy, but the problem was the second one. For a split second, I had no idea how to continue. Nevertheless, I thought of something to say under the wolf's exciting eyes.

"We have a Hokage, he's nice. People are usually nice in Konoha, I think. Oh, I have a little brother, you should meet him. He will either hate you or love you, there's really no in between. I'll tell you some more later, maybe when I can actually think straight." There, that was as far as my trust go when I was sleep deprived. The good news was, she was accepting of my vague answers. The bad news, she just moved on to the next question.

"Why would you give up your life for his?" I stayed still for a very long time, staring at the ceiling, and it was not because I didn't know the answer. On the contrary, for once, there was an answer as clear as day.

 _I am afraid that he will die a meaningless, purposeless death._

"Mmm, I don't remember doing that," I muttered innocently, and the wolf just whacked my head with her tail, causing me to frown in annoyance.

"Perhaps, it was nothing more than a girl who is trying to prove that she is not an unwanted burden. Running around creating havocs, only tolerable because of an order one can't refuse." I wondered how long it took me to formulate that sentence. I tried so hard make it sounds as ambiguous as possible, but then I realised, there was no way that what I had said didn't just expressed my sad reality of life in a crude and harsh manner.

"What a stupid girl, so desperate that she would die for something as useless as approval." Fuyuki chimed beside me, but it was void of any mockery and pity like she was just stating a fact. _It's so true, a bit too late for me to realise this now, but it was definitely a habit that got carried over from before I was even born._ "But nevertheless, it's very human." That phrase, she said it with an unusually caring tone, so different from her mischievous nature.

I used to think that the only thing that stood between me and my sleep was the wolf. So when the wolf was finally satisfied with the interrogation, I thought I could finally enjoy my rest. That was until I heard a string of knocking on the door. It was at that moment that I realised, I was never going to get any peace.

"Come in," I said in a bland voice, not even bothered to sit up straight because I knew exactly who it was. The door creaked open as my captain stepped me. Without even looking at him, I could just hear from his footstep how bored he was.

"I talked to the captain of this ship. We will arrive at the northeastern harbour of the Fire Country tomorrow afternoon, and after that, we will have to run back to Konoha. I have already borrowed a messenger hawk from the ship captain, so the Hokage-sama should know of the events in the Land of Snow before we arrive," He explained in a few succinct sentences. From the light rustling sound of a page turning, I knew exactly what he was reading. How the old book wasn't destroyed in the crossfire would forever be a mystery to me.

"Why is the wolf here?" He asked offhandedly. _Oh, hell if I know._

"She said she wants to experience a boat cruise, so she very kindly invited herself to stay." Fuyuki just grinned at me sarcastic explanation, but even she couldn't deny that it wasn't true.

"Here, some painkillers I found." Following his voice, I sat up and glanced at the little bottle of pills in his hand with curiosity. Internally, I was having a huge debate. Let's just say that over the years, I found sedative medicines very unpleasant. In fact, they were as bad as alcohol when it came to staying conscious. Something was wrong with this body in terms of alcohol and drug resistance. Genetics, when in doubt, just blame it on genetics.

"What, you want something stronger? Well, there is always the option of sake. One cup should knock you dead for a few hours." There was a light teasing in his tone as he shook the bottle to catch my attention. The sound of the pills was really annoying and really tempting at the same time.

"I am young, there's still time for me to build a resistance," I argued stubbornly. It was quite a disadvantage in my line of work since I wouldn't be able to take any espionage missions involving underground bars. Kakashi made sure of that.

"The day that you can actually hold any liquor is the day that I stop reading." _Which is never._ Yeah, I got the drift.

"What's so attractive with stories, anyway? They are unrealistic and fictitious, and they bear very little semblance to the reality, so why?" I couldn't help but asked, seeing that he always had the book with him. Although, I wasn't nearly as interested in the content of his book as his habit of bringing it everywhere; really, it was the phenomenon of someone so realistic and practical as him indulging in romance novels that really confused me.

"That's just it. They are stories, so technically, anything can happen. Miracles are not so rare anymore, and the endings, they can always be changed." It was a very lighthearted answer, like the one you would give to children while explaining to them the importance of hope. "Besides, the contents … they leave a lot to be imagined." And here ruined the innocence.

"I'll take the painkillers, thank you." Quickly, I jumped out of the bed and walked towards him. When I snatch the bottle from his hand, I asked: "How many?"

"Two tablets at most, don't take more than that." I gave him a light hum to show that I had heard him. Then, I pulled open the door and walked out, in hopes of finding a cup of water. The hall was swaying slightly, following the calm waves of the ocean. As I walked away from the man and the wolf, I wondered about what he had said about stories.

 _Miracles, what a nice thought._ It was in times like these that I wished I had chosen to change the ending of _that_ story. Because unlike the massacre, I knew now for sure, that I had had the power to change at least that one event.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

Time: one month before the base of an international drug ring in Brazil exploded due to unknown reasons

"What is your name?" The interviewer asked me. His flawless black suit contrasted against my white blouse. Black was supposed to represent order and sophistication, and white, purity and innocence.

"Sophia, Sir. Sophia Crowford." I answered just like what was written on the information provided for me. Sophia Crowford, nineteen, born in Southampton, looking for a job in this household as a maid in hopes of providing for her blind mother.

"Miss Crowford, your reference letter and resume look quite good. It says that you only have one family member, Elizabeth Crowford. Is that right?" The man asked again, eyes glancing over my stature, trying to catch any hints of uneasiness.

"Yes, Sir. She is my mother and she is currently living in Southampton." I replied obediently. There was indeed an Elizabeth Crowford in Southampton, but her daughter, Sophia, was killed three days ago in a hit-and-run incident. She died without any identification on her, so OLYMPUS packaged her identity and gave it to me.

"Very well, Miss Crowford. You are hired for now. A maid will come and take you to your room and they will tell you what to do. Welcome to the Howard Manor and I expect you to work hard." The man stood up and signalled me to the door. Timidly, I stood up as well and gave him a bow before walking out of the interview room.

William Howard, 49, started the business in illegal firearms trade twenty years ago. From then, he had started to gain a mass amount of wealth from selling weapons both inside and outside the country. After all, there never seemed to be a lack of violence and insurgency around the world. OLYMPUS wanted his secrets, his clientele and his sources, and they planned to negotiate for those. However, OLYMPUS didn't want to pay up and live up to their end of the bargain. That was where I came in.

It was not that William Howard wasn't careful in his selection of staff members. I was aware that they had done a very thorough background check on me and this was already my third interview. It was just that OLYMPUS was too good. For William Howard, who had never dealt with OLYMPUS in the twenty years of his illegal career, he had no idea what he was up against.

Of course, my identity was not flawless. Eventually, people would find out that my supposed existence didn't match the records, but it wouldn't matter. Because before that could happen, those who knew that 'Sophia Crowford' had ever set foot in here would disappear, along with the existence of 'Sophia Crowford' as a whole.

...

Helena was William Howard's wife, but she was not the mistress in charge of the manor.

She was Howard's first love, his wife at the age of eighteen before he had become rich from dealing with illegal weapons. Then, their love died, for reasons unbeknownst to me. Howard did not divorce Helena. Instead, he bought her a manor, placed her in the corner and brought in his new mistress. That had all happened nineteen years ago, and from then on, Helena had only been the Lady Howard in name while the mistress, Isabel, had everything Lady Howard could offer, except for a legitimate title.

I had started to learn about Helena's past when the head maid first announced to me that I was to serve Helena. The other servant girls started to give me looks of pity, but they would try to hide it when I looked at them. They were horrible at it.

It was not like I never learned about the state of the Howard household and its internal affairs. However, they were only words on files that I was supposed to remember in order to carry out my job flawlessly. When I heard about my post, the only thing I thought about was how being in an isolated position would affect my mission. Howard obviously did not trust me, since serving Helena was probably the farthest job from his office that I could get.

"Sophia, where is my peridot green paint?" It became painfully obvious that Helena was not suited for the rich lifestyle to which Howard had abandoned her, and I could see that on my first day to work.

"Here, Ma'am." I handed her that bottle of green paint, "Would you like me to wash those brushes?"

"Ah, yes, thank you." She handed me the stack of brushes with a smile. She shouldn't have to say thank you. The mistress commanded her servants like they were animals, demanding this, demanding that. But Helena, she thanked me. She was not suited for this lifestyle because she was too nice for this place full of lies and deceit.

Quietly, I took the brushes and started to wash them in a methodical manner. Helena's life was very monotonal, she didn't have any visitors - not even her so-called husband, and she rarely had servants. Other than the servants who brought her food from the kitchen, I was her only maid. All the others quit because of how bleak this job's future was. Her only hobby seemed to be painting, so she spent her days in her room, painting away her time.

Her paintings … they were interesting. Sometimes, she would paint pictures of the countryside. Lush greens and bright yellows, mixed with a blue that made even the ocean look pale in comparison. Sometimes, she would paint animals, random ones that stopped in her garden - the only property that seemed to be hers in this enormous manor. Pigeons, butterflies, squirrels, dropping by in the well-kept garden, oblivious towards the woman that observed them from afar.

However, the most abundant type of painting she drew was a flower. A specific type of flower that I didn't recognise. It wasn't any of the flowers that bloomed in her garden. No, those flowers were colourful, but the flower she painted was as white as snow. There she was painting again, the same type of white flower, the pure white a bright contrast even against the blank canvas. I handed her back the brushes as she traced a dark green stem under the white-petaled flower. The flower was beautiful. Whether it was because of her drawing techniques or that it was just this beautiful, I had no idea. Out of curiosity, I glanced around the room, seeing countless canvases filled with the same type of white-petaled flower. They were so similar in terms of colour and shape, yet every one of her paintings depicted something different.

"Lady Helena, are you going to respond to Lady Isabel's invite?" Hesitantly, I asked. I didn't want to disturb her, not that it was my problem, but she looked happy here, doing what she liked. However, the other woman, Isabel, didn't feel the same. Earlier today, she had sent a maid to deliver a message, saying that she wanted to chat with Helena. Seeing the girl's expression of pity, I gathered that this was not the first time Isabel felt the need to annoy the true lady of the house.

Her paintbrush paused for a bit, then she slowly put the brush down and turned towards me. I thought she would perhaps be angered by my insensitivity. After all, I was just here to get the job done.

"I suppose it's that time again, isn't it?" She whispered, "Be a dear and put away the paint for me, please. Oh, don't dump them out, just cover them with a dampened napkin. I finally got the perfect shade of green and I'd hate for it to dry just because that woman needs an audience for her temper tantrum." She joked as she went into her living room to change. I quietly started to clean up her station like she told me to, covering that unique shade of green with a dampened napkin. Just as I had finished, Helena walked out of the room in a plain white dress, her hair brushed and tied up in a soft bun. Soon, I led her out of the door, into the hall towards the main quarter of the manor, out of this isolated corner with so much shadow that blotted out the light of the sun.

...

"Here she is doing it again." "Who?" "Lady Isabel. Who else? She is embarrassing Lady Helena again." "Poor woman, having a husband like that, let alone living in the same house as the mistress…" "Shh. Do you want to get fired?" "You're right, if Lady Isabel hears one word of this, we are all out…"

The kitchen, always the place for gossip. With the loud sound of pans and steamers, every conversation could easily get lost in the fray. I was just here to get the tea, or at least, that was what I was supposed to do. As I carefully took out the set of delicate china from the cupboard, someone bumped into me lightly. I turned around a little too quickly, eyeing the kitchen staff in front of me.

"Your tea, miss." She said to me with a smile, holding out a tray carrying the teapot and the sugar. Her right finger tapped lightly, making short and long taps in between. Her seemingly confusing movements were very subtle, but it was enough for me to spell out the word 'OLYMPUS'.

"Thank you very much, I was just waiting for them." I returned the smile and accepted the tray, observing silently as she walked away without another word. I turned around, using my body to hide the contents of the tray from the eyes of others. Immediately, my finger went for the sugar bowl, carefully lifting the china and fishing out a small note. In small writing, there was a date, two locations and a sentence: wait for further orders.

I read over the note, memorising every number and word as I read it. The date was five days from now, which I assumed was the date for the negotiation. That meant, whether the negotiation succeeded or not, my job would end on that day. OLYMPUS didn't like those who said 'no'. They also didn't like to pay for anything they could get with assassination. The two locations pointed me towards hidden weapons that other agents - for example, that kitchen maid - had set up.

Silently, I packed the set of china onto the tray and hid the note in my palm. As I walked out of the kitchen, carrying the tea tray, I passed by a furnace used for combusting the trash. Taking advantage of the rest of the staff being busy gossiping or preparing the food over the sound of kitchenwares, I flicked the piece of paper into the furnace and watched it burn until there were only black ashes left.

"You…wench! How can you…how dare you call me that, when you are as infertile as an old hag!" It was quite amusing, watching Isabel get pissed off by Helena, who really didn't give a damn. It was a given rule in this house, that no matter how hard Isabel tries to get rid of Helena, Howard just refuses to do anything about her. He left her alone, but that was all there was to it. Perhaps that was why Isabel was always so angry at Helena, for holding the only thing she wanted right now: the legitimate title as Howard's wife.

Faced with Isabel's insult, Helena simply sipped her tea and smiled. How could she smile so genuinely with me, when she has to put up that fake face with Isabel? Isabel was younger than Helena and definitely more extravagant. Unlike Helena, who doesn't have any children - who couldn't have any children - Isabel has a son. An illegitimate son, but the only heir of Howard, nonetheless.

"Well, Isabel, I think it's getting late. If there is nothing else you want to chat about, I suppose I should get going." Without asking for permission, she stood up and walked out of the door. When she was a hallway away from Isabel's living room, she almost startled me with a string of laughter.

"I have always wanted to try that. Now that I have, how refreshing it is!" She laughed again as she walked back into her corner of the manor, where there was rarely any light that could shine through the thick walls and windows.

...

The trouble started to come the next day, and it was as random as it could get.

You see, the heir of this family, Jonathan Howard, was the typical rich son with questionable morals. I had been warned by other servants when I had been first employed. 'Keep your head down, don't catch his attention. If he tries to make advances on you and you say no, you will get fired and your reputation will get ruined. Forever." It made me wonder why anyone would try to get employed here. Right, the money. Despite everything, William Howard did pay his staff good money.

Luck didn't really agree with me when I only ever wanted to have a smooth mission. It was only my third day here, and trouble by the name of Jonathan Howard was already following me like a plague.

"Young Master Jonathan." I curtsied, bowing my head as the man in question blocked my way. Jonathan, the nineteen-year-old son of Isabel, inherited his mother's nasty mean streak.

"Say, I haven't seen you before, are you new?" He tried to start a casual conversation, but the greed and lust in his eyes were so evident that it was hard not to notice. _Of course, I am new here, and I would prefer if I never saw you,_ I thought silently, keeping a neutral look on my face.

"Yes, young master. If you don't mind, I must get going now, Lady Helena is waiting for me." I said as politely as I could. I had to think carefully now, one wrong step, my mission would be ruined, and I would be dead.

"Actually, I do mind. That bitch isn't worth even a single cent, you will have no future with her. But of course, if you make me happy, I could transfer you to my mother's side." His hands, those disgusting, slimy hands, slithered to my back, wounding themselves around my waist. Now, who would want to serve Isabel, whose temper was boosted by an ego the size of the Roman Empire? Instinctively, I took a step back. However, he grabbed my hand at the last moment, refusing to let go.

His strength was like a child compared to what I was used to. With one twist, his shoulder would be dislocated, and with another twist, his neck would go limp. However, I couldn't do that, I couldn't do anything that could jeopardise my mission. So if he wanted my body, then I couldn't say no. Because I owned nothing, I had already given them all to OLYMPUS. This was the predicament I was in. I, as the property of OLYMPUS, had no choice.

"Jonathan, please let go of my maid, I believe she did say that I was looking for her." Helena's voice was like a saving grace. Jonathan temporarily let go of my hand and turned to look at the blonde woman. I scrammed, walking to Helena without a second thought.

"Mother." He said it with so much sarcasm that it was like a blade. Mocking a woman who couldn't have a child, who couldn't be a mother. Now that was just cruel.

"Come, Sophia, let's go to the garden." Helena ignored him and walked away. Obediently, I followed her. I was supposed to act like a scared little duckling, so I did. She went straight to that flowerless plant like usual, tending to it with the utmost care. Like she was expecting something to happen, some miracle to appear.

"You must be wondering why I always care so much for this plant when it seems to pale in comparison to all the other spectacles in the garden." Suddenly, she spoke to me, her voice so light that I thought it would get carried over by the wind.

"That's because you have never seen it bloom. It's called the night-blooming cereus. Although I suppose some call it the 'queen of the night', but I think 'night-blooming cereus' sounds better. It doesn't have the vanity a queen would hold. It is said to only bloom once in a long time, so long that some only bloom once. However, the flower is so white when it bloom that I once thought the glow to be from its petals, not the moon." She sounded like she was reminiscing like she was immersed in her own little world. I didn't interrupt, so she continued.

"You know, on the night when William and I got married, this flower bloomed. There was a legend, that if you make a wish when it blooms, the wish would come true. I was so happy and content at that moment, I didn't pay any attention to it. Now, I draw it so many times, trying to recreate the beauty I had once seen that one single time, yet, I still can't seem to draw it right. That's why I wanted to make it bloom again so that I could see the flower one more time - the beauty I had missed." I didn't know what to think of it. I couldn't understand what she was feeling. Longing? Regret? Sorrow? Anger? That was what people should feel in these situations, right? But somehow, none of these felt right.

"Look at me, I am ranting." She gave me a smile, "Oh, let's go back, I just thought of something." Just like that, she stood up and dragged me back to her corner by my wrists. Did she sound excited? Why? Hadn't she just talked about her sad past?

She let go of my arm after we went back to her chamber. Immediately, she grabbed the painting she was working on after I got here, another picture for the flower she had been talking about. Carefully, she picked up one of the brushes and dipped it in white paint. Then she wrote something down on the black and dark green background. It wasn't until she held it in front of me that I could actually see what she wrote: To Sophia.

"I want to give this to you as a gift, of course, I have to finish it first." She said with mirth in her eyes as she let out an awkward laughter as if she were embarrassed by her rash decision. "I have very little power here, I am sure you know that. However, I do have enough power to keep you from being fired as long as I'm here. So I will do everything to protect you from Jonathan if you will let me."

Had she just offered to protect me? A stranger who had only been with her for three days? I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Yet at the same time, my instincts told me that she spoke the truth. She didn't have anything to gain by lying, and her voice was so earnest that even the best operative in OLYMPUS couldn't fake that. That moment, I really wanted to do something for her.

I smiled the brightest smile that I could find, somewhere in my deep, dark hole that had already become bottomless. "Thank you, Lady Helena, I will graciously accept it. Although I would like to keep it here even if you plan to give it to me, seeing as I don't plan to go anywhere." After more than a decade in the black ops, I should have known this. Lie as though you are eating candy, but never make emotional promises. It wouldn't do anyone any good. However, at that moment, I had simply forgotten that I was on a mission, that I have people to kill in four days.

With a smile, Helena put the painting back on the rack, "You know, when I think back to my wedding night when I saw the night blooming cereus bloom, I really did want to make a wish. Not that William would love me forever, no. I would have wished for a child, a daughter. I suppose she would be around your age, and I would hope that she would have the same beautiful eyes as you, Sophia."

I wasn't Sophia, I had never been. However, at that moment, I wished I were.

...

The fated day came so fast, regardless of how hard I had wished for it to be delayed. Howard had a party that night. He was celebrating, for what, I suppose I had an idea. Helena, of course, was not invited. However, I was assigned to help at the party because of how busy the other staff were. That night, I received my order.

"The negotiation is done, now the organisation wants him dead." 'Heracles' said emotionlessly. He came as the servant of one of the guests, someone affiliated with OLYMPUS, no doubt. He lifted the luggage containing who knows what as I led the way towards the storage room. Everyone was busy fixing the party hall, so it was just the two of us.

"Time and targets?" I went straight to the point.

"After the guests have left. As for the target, everyone in Howard's household. Howard, his two women, and his son. I will burn the main living quarters down afterwards, make sure someone from the servant quarter sees you going into that section and that's going to be your death certificate." He answered. I suppose that would be a good plan. All the actual family members lived in the main section, including Helena. The servants have their own lodging a few hundred metres away. If OLYMPUS could manage to make it look like the fire was accidental - wouldn't be too hard with the alcohol and weapon storage in the same picture - then all the servants would bear witness to it, but be unable to get there in time.

Silently, I helped him unload the luggage. Everyone in Howard's household. Despite the isolation Helena had experienced, she was still tied to him. OLYMPUS didn't like loose ends, anyone that had even the most remote familial relation to these targets with huge influences was usually taken care of as well, to prevent the possibility of the power being transferred to another. But still, she hadn't done anything wrong. She was like an innocent rabbit getting stuck in the crossfire.

"Any priorities?" I asked, still keeping my voice detached in an attempt to hide the impure motive I had. OLYMPUS usually had a priority listed out when dealing with multiple targets, the first priority was the must-kill, but the last? Depending on the situation, they may not need to die.

"What, you want me to cut you some slack?" It was a dangerous joke that ran in the organisation. 'Hercules' probably didn't mean anything, but it made my heart beat faster at the close revelation.

"Helena Howard lives in the opposite corner of the others. If William Howard is the first priority, then it would be hard to get to Helena if anything happens," I analysed calmly, trying to explain my way out of any suspicion. The man didn't show any sign of distrust at me, but rather, more of a worry for the situation at hand.

"If what you said is true, then make Helena the first priority. She is abandoned, therefore, her death wouldn't be easily discovered like the rest." After that, he walked away while carrying two huge suitcases.

My knuckles went white from clutching onto the luggage in front of me. It was a horrifying realisation, that I had basically sentenced Helena's sure death.

The party ended at twelve. The guests left and Howard was drunk. Around one, everyone retreated back to their rooms, except for a few poor souls who had to clean up the mess made in the party hall.

I moved through the dark halls like a snake. The weapons weren't hard to find, and after removing a few fake wooden boards, I found what I was looking for. Two handguns with the silencer, a few magazines, and an army knife. It wasn't much, but it was enough. I tucked the weapons into my belt in smooth motions, just like how I had always done it. Howard's room was in the left hall, with two bulky bodyguards at the door. I sneaked up to the room and hid in the shadows. It would be quick. It had to be quick.

The first bodyguard went down the moment I twisted his neck. The only sound that could be heard was the light crack, and then, there were none. The second one didn't even get a chance to yell before I slit his throat, destroying his larynx in the process. I grabbed onto his shirt as the body fell to make sure that the sound of someone dropping wouldn't be heard. Then I placed his body by the wall with the other dead guard and open the door to Howard's room.

"Isabel, what is it?" Oh, he was definitely drunk. I didn't know what OLYMPUS had promised him that made him so happy, but he sure as hell wouldn't be alive to receive it. Before he could utter another word in his inebriated state, I fired the gun at his head. In the fraction of a second, a hole appeared on his forehead. At this distance, I never missed. I would never miss.

As Howard's body dropped to the ground, I left. I had no time to waste, if I wanted to get to the other side of the house, where Helena was, I needed to move fast. Isabel was the next one since her room was the closest. After that, it was Jonathan. Both of them died in their sleep, drunk and unaware, much too lenient of a death for both of them.

I knew I would find her in the garden. Whether it was intuition or something else, I knew that she would be there, simply because the moon was so bright tonight.

"No need to hide, my child. I warned William about this day the moment I knew he was dealing with illegal firearms. Now, why couldn't he have listened to me? We would be average, but at least we would still be living a calm and peaceful life." For the first time in this short week, I heard the sadness in her voice. She had always kept her voice composed, whether she was talking to me or other people.

"It's fine, Sophia, I have very little to live. You see, William has hurt a lot of people, and no matter if you are here for revenge or not, if my death would make your life easier, then so be it." But I was not here for any reason as noble as revenge for justice. And she, she was just collateral damage.

"I am not Sophia." I didn't know why I said that, but it sounded almost like a desperate plea. Please, stop reminding me of my attachments. She looked at me for a second, before breaking into another smile again. Why the hell was she smiling? I was going to kill her, so why?

"My apologies then. However, if you do see Sophia - a beautiful girl, considerate as well - please tell her that I am sorry, I couldn't finish her gift. You see, I wanted to her to see the beauty I had once seen. But look at this night-blooming cereus, the bulb is growing, and after a few days, the flower will bloom again. If you could tell her to come and see it after a few days, I'm sure she would see the full bloom that could grant any wish." She was talking to me, I was sure of it. Suddenly, she stood up with her back against the tree. Slowly, I raised my hand with the gun and pointed it at her head. It was true, the white bud was already visible at the end of the dark green stem. Then I pulled the trigger.

There was the sound of a gunshot. Despite the silencer, the sound still echoed in my eardrums. When I looked up again, I saw a hole - still smoking - in the tree where Helena was standing in front of. She seemed surprised that somehow she didn't die when she was fully prepared to. I was too.

"Artemis, finish up quickly." Suddenly, Heracles' harsh voice sounded behind me. His hand was wrapped around a gun, so subtle, yet his hands were so tense.

As I watched him stood nervously in front of me, the horrifying thought just came out of nowhere: I could kill him, without ever compromising my identity. 'Heracles' had set up the whole manor, waiting for that accidental explosion. And OLYMPUS, it taught me everything I needed to know about how to set up a false death.

If I dared to move in any suspicious way, he would shoot my right shoulder immediately. But I had two guns, which meant that I could kill him right after that. After that, I could very well spin the lies: It wasn't me who was the traitor, it was him.

 _It was him who had suggested to me to place Helena as the first priority because he was affiliated with William Howard. He thought he could ambush me before I could kill the weapon dealer since Helena lived in such an isolated place. After all, that conversation was recorded by the micro-bombs in the suitcase brought in by 'Heracles'. There was always someone listening on those devices, in case they are discovered and needed to be triggered manually._

 _Right, with the lies … He shot me while I was trying to kill my last target - having abandoned his suggestion and had decided to kill the weapon dealer first. It caused me to miss the shot, right into the tree. Therefore, I had no choice but to shoot him. It was unfortunate, that the guards were alerted by the struggle and I had to run with Heracles' body before exposing our identities._

This way, Helena wouldn't have to die. She could get out before I inform the headquarter of the 'mishap' and burn the manor down in flames.

But … then what. Treason against the organisation, I couldn't even fathom the consequences of that choice. 'Heracles' was staring at me with an increasing impatience, and all my lies unravelled in front of him. It was the fear, telling me that no matter what I did, I could never run away. So the only way for me to live was to take another's life.

When he urged me again, I pulled the trigger instinctively, hardly even realising what I was doing. Before I knew it, the bullet had gone through her head and her body dropped elegantly.

That bullet, it shattered my fake life as Sophia Crowford and all my thoughts of betrayal.

I walked out of the manor and Heracles stayed behind to finish his part of the job. After a minute or so, the main section of the manor, where all the killings had been done, went up in flames. Those bright flames blazed through the garden, incinerating Helena's body as well as the night-blooming cereus that was due to bloom again. Yet, it never could.

OLYMPUS used fear to devoid of us of attachments, but even then, they understood the flaw in their system. Now, I realised that I had survived that far only because the fear had managed to oppress the need for attachment. And at the slightest instance of an imbalance, their mercy with me was done.

I was a desperate child. Looking for affection and approval at every turn. I was lying when I said that being promoted to 'Artemis' didn't cause any reaction. It was a small sense of pride. A guilty pride that caused me to clutch tight onto that position as if it was my only stamp of approval. But I was also a selfish girl. Craving for attachment, yet never having the courage to hold on to it.

I was lying to myself until this day, but they had seen through it the moment it started.

But now, I knew that I always had a choice. Finally, I was satisfied.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Is this your first time being a teacher?" Kakashi was startled by the sudden question. When he turned his attention from the girl who had just walked down the hall to the nonchalant wolf who seemed really out of place, the wolf clarified again.

"I don't mean by training soldiers until they are at some standard bar. I mean teaching someone your life long's experience, raising them as someone who will not only reach a bar but also surpass you." The Wolf's crystal eyes stared into him like the calm surface of a lake too deep to be known, and for a second, Kakashi started an internal debate.

He had never admitted being Maiko's teacher. Mentor, instructor … he skidded around the line. 'Teacher' was a word that held too much significance; the amount of significance that he wasn't ready to give. However, with that Uchiha girl whom he regarded as an anomaly, Kakashi realised that slowly, she had demanded those significances without him ever knowing it.

There was a time when she had shamelessly demanded ninjutsu every other week. While Kakashi never had more enthusiasm other than those born out of guilt and curiosity, he showed her the ones she had wanted.

That was the drill. Maiko had a question, Kakashi would perform the jutsu and Maiko would copy the jutsu and go practice it alone. At that time, she was the one who had demanded the attention, taking the initiative. For that, Kakashi was both amused and annoyed.

But that had changed ever since she joined Anbu. While she was still keen to learn everything she could, Kakashi had found that her approach became much more subtle, like she was afraid of angering him. There were even times that Kakashi had to forcefully teach her something she hadn't thought of learning (for example, foreign relations).

There was always things to learn, he realised that; she realised that. Kakashi supposed that this was what the wolves meant by 'teaching', but Kakashi felt like their relationship, at best, was 'undefined'.

Nevertheless, he nodded. It felt wrong to say otherwise, not when Maiko had put in all those efforts. In terms of passing on knowledge, he couldn't think of a better candidate than Uchiha Maiko.

"Do you plan on teaching anyone else?" The wolf asked again, and Kakashi wondered if she had a point to this conversation. Kakashi knew for a fact that he still needed to teach a genin team because it was his Jōnin duty (which he had managed to avoid for a decade by being in Anbu). However, if he had a choice, then he would like to say, please, no.

"Well, if you do, then you should know that your teaching method is problematic but still salvageable if you learn from your current experience." _She really doesn't mince her words, doesn't she?_ Suddenly, Kakashi had an epiphany as to why Maiko was so annoyed. "However, if you don't, then know that you are very close to ruining her, that girl. It would be better if you had just left her with my clan."

Ouch, that hurt. Kakashi narrowed his eyes at the wolf, wondering who the hell gave her the gut to say something like that. Kakashi felt like one of those moments where his jurisdiction was being stepped on by some newly promoted Jōnin. He didn't take those very well.

He was never the best teacher or even … actually, he was probably one of the worst kind - the not committed type. Oops, maybe the wolf had a point. His teaching style - which was basically the same as a study scroll with a video clip, no explanation given, all was left to interpretation - only worked with Maiko, who was equally a genius in her own right. She only needed to see a jutsu once to copy the basics; only need to see a strategy in use two times to realise its variations, strengths and flaws. He was trying to teach, and she was learning everything he could offer and beyond, so what more could one ask?

"How would you know? You've only seen her for a day and you have never known her before." Okay, maybe Kakashi was getting a bit defensive. Despite the harsh words from the wolf, Kakashi could tell no malice, it was simply full of worry.

"Young man, I have been passing down my clan's skills for generations. I may not know her whole history, but I hear her deepest words." The wolf snorted proudly, "Tell me when was the last time you had given her a praise; a sure sign that she did something to be proud of?"

 _Well, there was that one time …_ To Kakashi's surprise, he couldn't think of any example. Most of his comments were followed by some sort of sarcasm to keep Maiko focused on her flaws. He wanted to make sure that there would be no over-bloated arrogance, because he had been that kid once, and it cost him an eye and a teammate.

 _But she doesn't need it from me, for the starter, she had a shishou before … But Shinbara probably didn't know what to comment anymore seeing that he was very out of touch. Well, what about her Yamanaka friend … But their field of expertise was so far away that it wouldn't sound like a sincere acknowledgement. How about all the other Team Ro members … Um, it's very likely that they only see her as a kouhai. The Hokage? She only gets to talk to him when she was debriefing for a really fucked up mission._

It was at that point that Kakashi wondered, where the hell did she get her approvals from before? And he couldn't believe how long it took him to find the answer.

 _Oh crap. Itachi and Shisui. It was her greatest joy to be able to spar with them._

' _It was nothing more than a girl who is trying to prove that she is not an unwanted burden. Running around creating havocs, only tolerable because of an order one can't refuse.'_

The words that he had accidentally (or intentionally) heard outside of a closed door had finally made sense. Every body language, every sarcasm, every eye expression, someone as perceptive as her had definitely picked it up. There was never any kind of validation. If she had been lost before, then he just made it worse.

"She is young, lonely, and very malleable. You have the power to change her actions with a simple word. If you are not careful, she will miss the ultimate goal. Unless you want to raise a copy, then it's not your approval she should be seeking, it's to surpass your ability and then passing down hers. Your criticism is to help her improve, and your approval is to help her realise that she has something higher to reach," The wolf explained calmly. For some reason, she didn't sound as dissonant as before.

"What do you suggest I do then?" Kakashi asked.

"We are in a delicate situation, aren't we? It's not her skill that I'm worried about, it's the fact that she wasn't confident in her decisions. You are lucky that she's resilient, thus some small adjustments will do. But of course, it's not just your part, it's hers as well. Teaching, It's a two-way bridge," she said with a grin. Kakashi couldn't help but think of his old sensei - a role model in every way, even in the art of teaching. He hoped that his sensei was proud knowing that he was trying to improve as a teacher - something he had previously given up on because of his own arrogance. That, and the fact that Minato-sensei was probably laughing his head off at the scene of him being scolded by a wolf summon.

"Teaching is a hard skill to master, isn't it?" The she-wolf chimed in a challenging tone as the sound of footsteps approaching reached his ears. _I couldn't agree more._ Kakashi thought despite the fact that he still wasn't quite sure 'teacher-student' fitted their 'undefined' relationship. Their interaction was just so out of place, 'friends', 'senpai-kouhai', 'Captain-subordinate' … It was like a melting pot of everything, but he supposed that neither of them would protest.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

 _Five, four, three …_ I counted bitterly the moment the pain disappeared. I knew it. When the pain faded, the drowsiness would start quickly. When the countdown reached zero, I stood in front of my room and stared upwards. The ceiling turned for a second before it returned to normal. _Damn it, I knew it would happen._ A dizzy Maiko was never a happy Maiko.

Nevertheless, I pushed open the door, startling the man and the wolf who seemed like they were in a conversation. I stared at Fuyuki with suspicion, then I moved my gaze to Kakashi. But the moment I entered, they had stopped talking.

"Two pills exactly, you can count the rest." I pushed the bottle back into Kakashi's grip. He twirled the medicine bottle for a few seconds before it disappeared from my sight. The room was so quiet when I came in like my mere presence was making everything awkward. For some reason, I felt like I was being framed for something I didn't do.

"Okay? Anyone care to tell me what happened?" I asked. No one answered me.

"If you don't want to tell me what happened, then can one of you leave? Or even better, both." I asked, but it seemed like none of them actually wanted to leave. _I want to sleep, and having a curious wolf in the room with a demanding captain doesn't exactly create a peaceful atmosphere._

"You are probably right, though. Stories can be changed, but it's not the miracles that changed them. It's the people," I said to Kakashi suddenly, partially because I need to get the epiphany out of my system; partially because I felt the need to say something positive to lighten up the mood. Nothing was more positive than the acknowledgement of hope.

"Not a miracle? The fact that you are positive for once is a miracle itself." When Kakashi commented offhandedly like usually, Fuyuki shot him a criticising glare. I heard him mumbling something like 'force of habit'. _Weird._ Something definitely happened while I wasn't here because that look was usually reserved for me only. Maybe the painkillers had dulled my judgment as well as physical pain, or maybe it was because that the wolf seemed to be on my side of the argument, I felt brave enough to say something back.

"Well, sorry if I don't reach your standards. What would you have me be, then, if not this emotionally troubled mess that you often sent to psychotherapy?" I asked with a bit of mockery. It certainly caught him by surprise, because for once, he looked speechless at my question.

"See, I don't understand your people. How long has it been since my clan was massacred? Two years, maybe a little longer. Yet all of you seem very adamant about making me 'normal' again. So what if I am a bit emotionally troubled? It's not therapy sessions I need; it's called 'time', in case you are unfamiliar with that concept." Perhaps the drug really dulled my critical judgement, but it felt really good to let everything out. I had thought of many possible responses that my captain had in store with me, but the one thing I hadn't been expecting was a nod.

"I agree," He said with utmost seriousness, much to my surprise. "But time is a luxury for you. Do you have any idea how many pairs of eyes are watching you, judging you? Time is not something I can give you even if I want to. Pick something else." It was like a dare that he had proposed. But you know, I was feeling brave.

"Faith, I choose faith." Those were the most confident words I had said all day. "Those people who wanted to watch the show, screw them. And your ridiculously high standards that fluctuate depending on your mood, I will reach all of them so that you will have to make up new ones. Have a little faith, it won't kill you." So what if I seek approvals, it was not something to be ashamed of if I was willing to work for it.

When the room went silent again, I realised that I had probably just made the awkwardness increased tenfold. For the longest time, Kakashi didn't answer me, and it made me wonder if I had asked for too much. After all, faith was a precious thing in our line of work.

Without a care, I laid back on the soft bed. Kakashi was different after I had returned - not exactly gloomy, but it was like he was contemplating something and would like to be left alone. Not even a second later, I heard the door creaking open.

"Sure, I'll give you a year to reach captaincy." _I'm sorry, what?_ "By the way, just for the record, if I didn't have any sort of commitment, not even the Hokage could force me to be tolerate of an 'unwanted burden'," It took me a whole five seconds to process those assertive words, and when I was done, the door had already been closed.

 _Well, since he leaves everything to interpretation, I'll just take that as a yes._ Unknowingly, I started laughing. It was the drugs, just blame it on the drugs. The lighthearted chuckles lasted for a few seconds until another sense of drowsiness washed over me. _Approval, it's like pure dopamine._

However, when I rolled onto my side to make myself more comfortable, I remembered that there was one more smuggler that I had to deal with.

"What did you say to him?" I asked her lightly. "You just displeased my captain, it's a rare feat, but it's going to make my life harder, not yours."

"Trust me, he is not displeased. We just exchanged some teaching tips, that's all." I couldn't tell if she was joking or not, but for the sake of my sanity, I stopped asking.

"Are all humans interesting like the two of you?" Before I fell asleep, I had vaguely heard Fuyuki asking in amusement.

"Not always. We are just special." I replied, but as soon as I saw the confused expression Fuyuki gave me, I added, "We've got lots of crappy problems, but we are dealing with them. That's what makes us so interesting."

* * *

A/N: So this concludes Arc 2. Next, we will start on Arc 3 - Answer. Preview: Danzō ... and you know the gist, and this will cover the last of the pre-canon before the canon begin. Thanks everyone for reading, since we are almost at the half year anniversary, and I am proud for lasting this long.


	31. Chapter 31 - Reclamation

A/N: So now, we start with a slow transition into the third arc. Beta'd by Alice J.

* * *

Chapter 31 - Reclamation

 _This looks awfully lot like a body bag._ That was the first thought that came into my mind when I saw the big black bag hanging on the rack. I couldn't believe this. I finally get a day off and I have to use it for _this?_

"Miss, your kimono." The employee at the cleaning shop handed me the body一I mean, the cleaning bag and I returned the courtesy with a smile. Quietly, I held the bag of clothing articles and walked to the side. It was very heavy, making me wonder just what the hell was the kimono made out of. Out of curiosity, I slipped open the bag to observe the fabric.

The kimono wasn't that bad. The base of the fabric was white and it was decorated with flowers of several shades of red. It was sort of pretty, but it was not the reason why I chose it. Underneath the white outer layer, there were seven other layers in either red or white. Now, this was the only formal kimono in my size that I could find in the Uchiha Compound that was under ten layers.

After the fiasco in the Land of Snow, which was hastily resolved by an insincere apology from the Snow Daimyo that basically said 'I'm sorry that there's a misunderstanding, but your shinobis tried to kidnap me, so I guess we are even. Here, have some metal and let's forget that this ever happened' but in an elongated version filled with unnecessary words.

A new trading clause had been signed. Compared to the one before, the terms in this clause was essentially a blowout sale for Konoha. People in Konoha was happy about the fact that the inflation of metal prices had gone down, so the Hokage did not start a war for our sake. I wasn't happy when I heard that I couldn't kill the Snow Daimyo, but I was content when I got the pay for an S-rank mission.

However, there was something strange about the trigger of this whole event. The Snow Daimyo's kill order was so sudden and unexpected, almost as if he had a secret he wanted to protect no matter what. Nevertheless, Kakashi and I destroyed around ten percent of their military forces and the Hokage had ordered close surveillance on any movement regarding the Land of Snow. It was unlikely that they would dare to stir up trouble anytime soon.

The point was, something had changed: they started to take notice of me, not as a kunoichi nor as an Anbu agent, but as the representative of the Uchiha Clan. I kept telling myself that it was because I had turned fifteen last week, that it had nothing to do with what had happened in the Land of Snow. But rumours spread fast. It wasn't long before people started to blab about the black fire that had incinerated the entire coastline. That was an exaggeration of what had really happened, but I guess I shouldn't really be surprised.

So to accommodate my newly made reputation, apparently, they sent me an invitation for an upcoming gathering of all of the clans in Konoha. From what I knew, this was more of a social gathering than anything, where the clan heads chat and complain about recent events and introduce their heirs to each other. It sounded painful, but it would be very rude not to accept the invitation they so 'graciously' sent out.

I was an 'honorary' clan head, which made me barely meet the requirements for the attendance. Then there was Sasuke, who was the 'heir' at the moment. But with one look at the heavy kimono I had picked out, he walked away without mercy and left his sister to the wolves.

"Oh, Senpai! That's a beautiful kimono!" Just as I was about to sigh, I heard a cheerful voice behind me.

"Hi, Momo. How are you doing?" I greeted my little kouhai, who looked very happy to see me for reasons unbeknownst to me. After the last Chunin Exam, all three members of Akira-shishou's genin team had passed (just barely, or as shishou told me) and were promoted to Chunins. Maybe this says something about Akira-shishou's superb teaching skills.

"I'm good, senpai! Satoru and I are doing fine in the Chunin corps, but Ryuu … I don't know where he went. Akira-sensei said to not worry, so I hope he will be fine," Momo said with a worried tone. I narrowed my eyes slightly at Momo's words, suspicion heavy on my mind as to where Ryuu went. After all, there was only one place where identities were kept secret. Akira-shishou had a tendency to pick a favourite (even if it was more or less at a subconscious level), and in his most recent team, it was Ryuu. However, I would pick Momo any day just because she was such a hard-working and kind girl.

"If Shishou said so, then I suppose you shouldn't worry too much," I reassured the girl who gave me a bright smile in return. Suddenly, I remembered something so I asked the little kunoichi, "Momo, do you know how to wear a formal kimono?"

"Uh, senpai, regular kimonos, sure. But if you are talking about _that_ ," she pointed at my body bag, "then, unfortunately, I have no idea."

The look on my face must have been heartbreaking, as she immediately bowed with her hands clutched tight above her head.

"I'm so sorry, senpai! I should have paid more attention in kunoichi class!" She did look very sorry at the prospect of me drowning in misery, so I had to reassure her that it wasn't her fault and that she was a great help. Eventually, I left the shop with my heavy body bag and waved goodbye to my little kouhai.

I had five hours until the gathering, but I had no idea how to wear this really expensive kimono. _Think, who else might know about women's kimonos?_ Well, there was one more option I could try, but I had no idea where to find her. However, I did know someone who could potentially tell me that location … after some persuasion.

So, was this it? On one of my rare off-days, I had to go on a manhunt - not the type I would like to have. This sounded like the beginning of a dreadful day already.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

Kakashi was having a relatively nice day. This was one of the rare occasions where he didn't have any mission assigned. He had planned to spend the afternoon enjoying _Icha Icha Paradise_. Then again, he should have known not to rely too much on his hopes for it to last, considering those he surrounded himself with. Still, he was somewhere ranging from mildly annoyed to moderately irritated when he heard the knocking on his door.

She was back. Again.

Yes, that demanding girl was back. Like a puppy high on adrenaline, she went back to the phase of shamelessly demanding every skill she could find. He supposed that he had asked for it when he set up that standard for her. It was, in the essence, his only standard. Because once she reached captaincy, she would no longer be under his care and thus, free to go to any direction she wanted.

It was a bit melancholy, Kakashi supposed. When he actually took five minutes of his precious time to comb through what Maiko needed in order to reach that bar, he realised that there weren't much left that he could teach her. Experience, the biggest flaw of young shinobis, the one criteria that Maiko was still lacking. However, that wasn't exactly something he could teach her. Still, the demanding kunoichi was really bringing back that feeling of annoyance and amusement, mixed in a ratio of four to six, only achievable by Uchiha Maiko.

When he went and opened the door, the first thing he saw was a huge black bag which the girl was holding behind her back. _That's not a body bag, is it?_ He didn't smell any blood nor the stench of a corpse, so maybe not?

As if reading his mind, the girl sighed and said, "Rest assured, it's not a body bag and there is no dead body in it."

Kakashi nodded slowly, still quite confused by the sudden visit. "Okay? Do you have any extra information you might want to add?" he asked.

"Yes, I need a favour. It may break some minor protocols, but if you look at it the right way, it can be as small as you want it to be." That was not a good start to a conversation. Maybe Kakashi was just pessimistic, but it sounded awfully like a euphemism for illegal stuff. At that moment, the likelihood of a dead body being in that black bag just increased exponentially.

"You can come in first. It's best not to flaunt a body bag in the open right in front of my apartment. I live a very comfortable and low profile life and I would like to keep it that way." Just in case that there really was a body or something illegal in that bag, Kakashi would like to make sure that there wasn't any head of a missing-nin rolling out the bag, freaking every civilian on the street out.

Maiko rolled her eyes at him, but she still politely took her shoes off on the doorstep before walking in, all the while holding her 'not-body-bag' high so that it wouldn't touch the floor. Kakashi watched the girl sit down on _his_ couch and drop the bag unceremoniously onto the seat next to her without an ounce of guilt or discomfort. There better not be a corpse or anything unpleasant in that suspicious bag, or she would owe him a new couch.

"You are not going to ask me to bury a corpse for you, are you?" He asked jokingly, knowing full well that it would make her irritated.

"So little trust in me. No, I am not asking you to commit a crime for me. I just need an address, Uzuki-senpai's address." She said lightly, pausing a bit before the last phrase as if pondering over whether or not he would agree. _Otter's address?_ Kakashi was utterly confused now. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't give up his subordinate's personal information. However, one thing he had learned over the years was that Uchiha Maiko never brought him any problem with normal circumstances.

"Any good reason? You do know that an Anbu agent's personal information is confidential, even if you are on the same team as them." Kakashi didn't even need the girl's amused glare to tell him that what he had just said was very ironic. Everybody on his team knew Rabbit's information, in fact, with more details than they should.

"I can give you a reason, although it might sound ridiculous. Because even as I repeat it in my head right now, it sounds so stupid." She said with a dry laugh before continuing, "I have a formal gathering to attend in five hours, and I don't know how to put on a formal kimono. Considering that Otter is the only female I have established a relatively close relationship with, other than my kouhai who has no clue on how to solve my problem, I thought I might as well try to ask her."

Kakashi had to stay silent for a few seconds to process that information. _She's right, it does sound ridiculous._ However, the more he mulled over it, the more it made sense. He did warn her that once their mission from the Land of Snow ended, her identity would be exposed. That had been her debut as the Uchiha Clan Head, and there was nothing more eye-catching than slaughtering an army. It was no surprise that the village council and the other clans had taken notice of her.

 _She is preparing for it_ , Kakashi realised. She knew what she was getting into and how she was expected to behave. Even if everything she had to do today would be the opposite of her usual habits, she was still trying to accomplish them without a fail.

"I don't know which part is sadder. The fact that you only know two kunoichis in the entire Konoha well enough to name them, or that you are asking an Anbu agent for party fashion advice." Kakashi decided that the least he could do for her was to _maybe_ relax her mood a bit so that she wouldn't appear so nervous and twitchy. But then, he remembered how unpopular his jokes were with the Uchiha girl.

"I'm already in a bad mood, Captain. Please refrain from pissing me off anymore or I might just be tempted to carry out my urge of stabbing a few holes in you." She glared at him and tapped her finger very lightly on the swords strapped to her waist. _Well, I tried._

"So, it's the Clan thingie or whatever today, isn't it? Sounds dreadful." Not so subtly, he changed the topic. A moment later, the girl looked at him with question marks.

"The Hatake Clan is still on the village register, so they send me an invitation every year. In fact, there's one in the trash can right now. You can just learn from me and not go." Unlike Maiko, Kakashi had abandoned anything to do with clan responsibilities. In his defence, there weren't much left to the clan name. But he supposed that there was still much left to the Uchiha name, at least to this pair of siblings.

"See, you can do that and people still respect you. However, if I throw that expensive piece of paper with the perfect calligraphy into the trash can and forget it ever existed, I am somehow rude, arrogant and condescending. Considering that my brother - and I, to some extent - still think that my clan is worth salvaging, I decided not to be the temperamental child who tarnished the very little positive reputation that my clan still possesses." Well said, spoken like a true aristocrat with sarcasm embedded in every superfluous word.

"Now, you are avoiding my request by changing the direction of this conversation elsewhere." Against the girl's accusing claim, Kakashi didn't exactly deny it. He simply ignored it.

"And you really should start using honorifics if you don't want to be seen as rude. Funny, it seems that you can remember the rules with everyone but me," he said casually, not at all phased by the Uchiha death glare he was getting.

"I can call you whatever honorifics you want when you give me the address." On the area of misdirecting a topic, Kakashi could do it all day for no other reason than the fact it was amusing to watch. However, the same could be said for Maiko. Once she wanted something, she would bite on it like a shark, never letting it go.

"I heard the food there is nice, and it's free."

"Right, because I totally look like a poor soul who needs to steal food from a party." With a slight pause, she surveyed his room quickly. When she laid her eyes on the _Icha Icha_ book on his coffee table, Kakashi knew exactly what she planned to do.

Kakashi immediately flickered across the room, reaching for that limited edition novel with Jiraiya-sama's signature. He was late by just a fraction of a second as Maiko grabbed the book and flickered to a corner. She learned from Shisui of the Body Flicker, after all.

"I know you really want to continue reading your precious book, but I'm not leaving until you tell me what I want to know." She held up the novel by her head like a tempting trophy. _Now, who taught her how to read situational cues and use it to her advantage?_ Right, he did. At the moment, he wasn't sure whether he should feel accomplished or betrayed.

"Fine, I'll give you her address under the condition that you are not to mention my name." Reluctantly, Kakashi agreed. He was probably breaking some Anbu protocols right there - just minor details … Besides, she would find a way to get that information herself anyway.

When Maiko finally got what she wanted, she picked up her body bag with satisfaction. "See, that wasn't so hard, was it, Kakashi-senpai?" She said with feigned innocence as she dropped the novel into his hands on her way out.

Yep, he was definitely too lenient with her recently.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I felt like I had sent myself on a wild goose hunt. But when I actually reached the finish line, I didn't really want to cross it. _Oh, screw it, I don't have time to waste._ I knocked the door lightly and waited for a few seconds before the door creaked open to reveal a woman with long purple hair.

"Rab… Maiko-chan, why are you here?" The woman caught herself before spouting out the Anbu codename by accident. Slowly, her eyes moved to the huge black bag over my shoulder. I could see it in her expression that she was contemplating the chances of it being a body bag.

"Good afternoon, Uzuki-senpai. First of all, this is not a body bag. In fact, I was wondering if you could help me with something," I greeted her politely. Otter was someone I really hit it off with. She was very kind to me when I first joined Team Ro, not to mention her kenjutsu skills were something not to be trifled with. However, before she could say anything, a loud round of curses rang from the room.

"Anko! Keep it down in there, I have a guest!" My senpai yelled back immediately.

"I'm sorry for interrupting. I'll just … go now. See you at work," I said. I was ready to scurry away, but Otter stopped me and pulled me into the ajar door. If there was one thing that was common in Anbu, it was that fact that we all like use actions rather than words.

"It's fine, what kind of senpai would I be if I can't even help a kouhai in need." _Ah, this is why she is my favourite senpai,_ I thought as she directed me through the door. She took my body bag and hand it by the door. It seemed that she had already figured out that it was actually a dry cleaning bag.

"Besides, you actually knocked, unlike these two who just invited themselves in without informing me." She signalled to the three people sitting at the coffee table. A deck of cards spread across the table top, a few more was tossed onto the floor as a woman with the spiky ponytail lamented and cursed.

"You started the gambling game, so don't blame others when you lose money." The man beside her with a scar across his nose rebutted immediately as he picked up the cards and reshuffled them. I couldn't help but feel that I had seen him somewhere, but my memory was hazy at the moment.

"He's right, pay up, or do you want to add this week's debt to last week's?" The third man with dark circles under his eyes joined in as well before the spiky-haired women threw a poker card at him.

Generation, this was the concept of generation. Konoha thrived on the idea of camaraderie, therefore, people formed packs within their generations - like this one in front of me. One find packs within their academy graduates who were often around their age. I had envied this framework once. Sometimes, I had wondered, if I were to graduate a few years later, would I fit in this concept of generation?

Probably not, I would most likely find a way to get out of the conventional framework somehow.

"Ooh, who's this cute little thing you've brought." The women chirped with curiosity as she suddenly appeared in front of me and bent down to study my face. Yeah, not creepy at all.

"It's Maiko, nice to meet you too," _random stranger,_ I said to the woman whose face was too close for my comfort.

"Mitarashi Anko's my name. Say, how do you know Yūgao?" She asked in a way that made me feel like I was being interrogated. I was fifty percent sure that it was her intention.

After some thoughts, I just said briefly: "Teammates. We are teammates." That was as ambiguous as it gets. The women - Anko - let out an 'ah' in understanding, and the two other people stopped their card games, suddenly curious about this random stranger in the apartment. One thing that I had learned over the years, confidentiality in Anbu nowadays didn't worth nearly as much as it was advocated.

"So … I should probably introduce you to my friends. You already met Anko, that's Umino Iruka." Otter pushed past the spiky-haired woman and pointed at the man with a scar across his nose bridge. "And that's my boyfriend, Hayate." When she pointed to the third man at the table, her voice dropped off timidly and started blushing light. That was kind of sweet, but it wasn't the main point I was pondering. When I heard the name 'Iruka', I suddenly remembered where I had met the man.

"You are Sasuke and Naruto's Academy teacher." I just blurted it out of the blue. It made sense, I might have seen him somewhere when I was picking up Sasuke. Besides, he was the only teacher that Naruto wouldn't stop talking about. Just to clarify that I wasn't a stalker, I added: "Sasuke is my younger brother, and Naruto talks about you often. He says you are his favourite teacher." Seriously, I taught Naruto most of his taijutsu, yet I couldn't even get that title.

"Haha, that's nice of you to say, Maiko-san, umm, I mean, Uchiha-san." He changed the name to address me as he scratched his head in embarrassment, which kind of defeated my point of never telling anyone of my last name unless absolutely necessary.

"Ah, that explains the pretty face." Before I could protest, Anko had already placed a hand on my cheek and tilted my chin up for further examination. "All the Uchihas have such nice genes, shame that most of them are gone." Well, that was blunt.

"Hands off. Please." I added the last word after much debate. I mean, this conversation could go both ways and one of them was much more diplomatic in the approach - which I should probably learn - than the other.

"Oops, my bad. I usually say things without any filters." The pendant on her neck swung in front of my eyes and its close resemblance to a snake fang was giving me a bad vibe, though, not necessarily directed towards the candid woman. People who were brave enough to say whatever they wanted was rare these days.

"That's quite alright _if_ we can just keep a reasonable distance." I poked her wrist and guided her hand away. This woman was … eccentric, that was the word I was looking for.

"So, about that favour which you are about to ask, what is it?" It was my favourite senpai who saved the day. Suddenly, I remembered exactly what I was here for, so I pointed to the forgotten body bag by the door.

"Ah, I see." "By the size of the bag, I'd say that it's very dreadful." Both women sighed in pity and I nodded frantically. _Finally, someone understands my pain!_

"How many layers?" Otter asked me.

"Eight. Or six, if you take out the outer and the inner layers," I answered cheerily for absolutely no reason at all.

"Lovely." I was sure that she didn't find it lovely at all. "Why don't you take it to that room and hang them up one layer at a time. I'm sure that I can help you figure it out." She said to me kindly as she pointed to one of the doors.

"Thank you, Uzuki-senpai, you definitely are and will always be my favourite senpai," I said as sincerely as I could before heading off to follow her instructions. In the background, I heard Anko muttering: "Is that seriously the Uchiha who slaughtered a whole army?" _Hey, I'm in a desperate situation both then and now._

"Huh. This makes no sense." When I finally hung up everything (which basically covered all the wall space), I stared at it in amazement.

"At least it's a very pretty kimono," Yūgao comforted beside me.

"Why am I here as well? I was having a winning hand!" Anko complained (even though she really wasn't winning), seeing that she had been dragged into the room by Yūgao. "But the fabrics are seriously expensive. You're one of those rich kids." _I would be if I can actually liquidise all the useless things in the compound._

"It's been a long time since I graduated from the Academy, I hope I still remember the things they teach at the Kunoichi class," the purple haired woman mumbled lightly.

"Kunoichi class? I don't remember a thing from those useless classes," Anko mocked with a snort as she sat down on the floor with a bored expression.

"I skipped all of them," I added helpfully, and that earned me two weird looks. _What, if Itachi didn't have to take them, I wasn't going to either._

"Okay, you win. I like that delinquent attitude, though," Anko commented.

"You two are hopeless." My senpai shook her head lightly, then she asked, "Not that I don't welcome you, but how did you get my address?"

"A stray dog led me to you." I answered instinctively, "I returned its favourite bone, so the dog led me to your apartment." Kakashi did say that no throwing him under the bus, so technically, I never mentioned his name.

"That's … nevermind, I'm just going to pretend that it's true."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I suppose that this gathering thing happened every year. I didn't know much about the ones in previous years, but this year, the gathering was hosted by the Hyūga Clan.

There weren't many clans in Konoha big enough to have a grand gathering hall, but the Hyūga Clan was one of them. Being one of the four noble clans since the founding of Konoha, its influence in the village was not to be underestimated. The Uchiha Clan used to be able to rival the Hyūgas, both in clan size, title, and dōjutsu. Not anymore.

I walked towards the Hyūga compound gate, following the clan heads in front of me. The heavy kimono weighed down on my body, forcing my steps to be slow and heavy. Even though the invitation instructed formal attires, it was not like it was very strictly enforced. Take Inuzuka Tsume for example, that woman strolled in wearing a jacket and training pants, and not one guard in the Hyūga compound dared to stop her. However, the problem was, if I were to do that, I was pretty sure that they would fling me back out simply because they didn't recognise me. Also, right now, I carried the dignity and image of the Uchiha Clan. For Sasuke's sake, and my parents' sake, I should at least try to do my best.

I handed the Hyūga Clan member by the door the invitation. His pearly Byakugan eyes eyed me critically before they landed on my letter invitation. After a few seconds, he raised his eyes again and said, "Uchiha-san, welcome to the gathering, please proceed to the grand hall." I nodded once before entering and walked down the one-way path that led to the hall.

Everyone was standing with their back straightened, holding their composure as stiff as they could. I would laugh my head off if not for my desperate attempt to hold it in. I was not born for this; I was born to fight. I didn't have a way with words, so what was I here for?

"Uchiha-san, I am glad you could make it. Would you like to talk for a bit?" Suddenly, I heard a voice beside me. I tried to turn around gracefully, but instead, my instincts got the best of me and I whipped my head around in the blink of an eye. Standing before me were the Jōnin Commander Nara and his wife Yoshino-san.

"Jōnin Commander, Yoshino-san, it's an honour to meet you here." I greeted. Due to Sasuke's common random appearances at the Nara compound, the Nara housewife had insisted that I call her Yoshina-san instead of Nara-san. Nara Shikaku held out a hand and guided the three of us to a rather deserted corner in the hall. When a Nara goes through the trouble to talk to you, the only option was to listen, especially if that Nara were the Jōnin Commander.

"Nara-san, I must thank you for letting my brother come to your compound despite all the trouble he has caused." I was very thankful for Hokage-sama's order and the Jōnin Commander's help. It was not a fail proof strategy, but it was definitely safer than leaving him at the apartment when neither Shun nor I were home. Besides, Nara Shikamaru, the heir of the Nara Clan was very successful in dealing Sasuke several blows of defeat in Shōgi and failure would do some good for Sasuke every so often.

"That is no trouble at all. However, the real question is what do you plan to do, now that you are under the council's attention?" Ah, the Naras, they really like to keep things simple and trouble free.

"I have little experience in this, but would you be willing to give me some advice?" I asked plainly. The Naras wouldn't do troublesome and unnecessary things, so the fact that the Nara was talking to me meant that he was doing more than making small talk. Whether it was the influence from Hokage-sama, or that he genuinely wanted to help me, I would take it. Every bit of help I could get in this muddy new world I stepped in was critical for every step I would take.

"You really don't know the art of subtlety, do you," The Nara said with a raised eyebrow, a little surprised by my frankness.

"I just thought that it would be faster and easier for me to spit it out. Besides, I don't believe that flattery and empty words would work well with Nara-san." Since the Jōnin Commander didn't walk away, I would assume that my answer was correct.

"See, this room that is full of Clan Heads and heirs, they have known each other for years, if not for decades. Ever since the massacre, the power balance has pretty much been set without the presence of the Uchiha Clan. Normally, they wouldn't want to introduce any other potential players, and they would just leave you be until you demand attention. However, because of what has happened in the Land of Snow, they have no choice but to take notice of you. This is a trial period, we are trying to gauge what you are and what you want to do with your position as the Uchiha Clan head. So now you have two paths, young Uchiha Clan Head. You can pretend like nothing ever happened and out of the sheer desperate preservation of balance, they may leave you alone for a few more years. Or, you can step into the arena and try to integrate yourself into this circle. Many are curious here. They have heard of your tales and read your reports, but they want to know you personally. So, which one will you choose?" He laid out the map for me in a low and calm voice as I listened to every one of his words attentively. However, this seemed to be all he was willing to offer because he walked away right afterwards along with Yoshino-san who gave me a bright smile before leaving.

 _Which path? That is the question of the day, isn't it? So what do I want to do? Hide or pave the path for Sasuke? I thought I was ready for this, and I even cleaned a kimono for this. Now, I just need to take the first step. The arena, I suppose that it is my time to enter._

Having said that, it seemed like the arena opened its gates before I could even attempt to push it open. Before I could even consider how to integrate myself, someone decided to invite me into a conversation, and it was none other than the host of the gathering, Hyūga Hiashi.

"Uchiha-san, I am glad that you accepted our invitation. I hope that you are enjoying the event." The Hyūga Clan Head inquired with a stern voice and his pale Byakugan focused on me with no show of any emotions.

"I am very much enjoying the gathering and I thank you for the gracious invite, Hyūga-san." I was not really enjoying the gathering, but oh well, there was only one response I could really say.

"I realised that you probably have not had a chance to meet all the other clan heads before, therefore it would only be proper for me to invite you this time." There were some things that were better left unsaid, for example, the real reason of why I was invited, or that they didn't really want to see another Uchiha clan rising.

"Indeed, and I appreciate your careful considerations." I really couldn't think of anything else to say. The Hyūgas and the Uchihas, I guess that I could say that we were adversaries in many fields. The two clans had similar backgrounds, similar prestige, and similar dojutsu. They say that the more similar the two competitors, the more likely they would fight in order to be above the other. But then again, that was my father's generation. I neither had the power nor the time to play this game of clan feuds.

"This is my daughter, Hinata. I remember that you have a brother of the same age." Hyūga Hiashi stepped aside and pushed a small girl around ten to the front. The girl had the same pearly Byakugan as her father, but unlike her stern father, the girl lowered her head shyly and buried her eyes behind her dark purple bangs.

"Hinata-hime, nice to meet you. You probably don't know me but I believe that my brother, Sasuke, is in the same class as you in the Academy." I bent down and said to the small girl with a smile. I extended my hand and placed it in front of her. Hinata glanced at her father for a second, then she quickly shook my hand after seeing her father give a nod.

"Hinata is still young, but I do hope that she can learn a few things from you. I have heard some impressive things about you despite your young age. What do you hope to accomplish from now on?" So we were on the actual topic now? After that string of useless pleasantries. _But how am I supposed to tell you when I am not even sure myself?_ Still, all I could do was to keep that smile plastered on my face.

"I don't expect to achieve everything in a short time. I am still only a Chunin and I have much space for growth. It is my brother's dream and mine to restore the Uchiha clan, but I know that it will take more than just a generation's time." I continued to smile, hoping that my message came through to him in the politest way possible. _I have no intention of upsetting your current power balance right now, but you better believe that the Uchiha Clan is coming back, whether you like it or not._

"How do you plan to do that when you are still a Chunin yourself, my child?" Suddenly, an unpleasant voice intruded our conversation. _That spider, that irritating spider._ As I suspected, a man dressed in black and white robes with half of his face bandaged walked towards us. _Tap. Tap. Tap._ The sound of his cane tapping against the wooden floor irked me to no end. _Shimura Danzō, the spider that weaves its web in the dark._

 _I can't see your greed because you are too good at hiding, but I know it's there. So what do you want from me this time?_

"Surely you've realised that every clan head of the prominent clans is above the level of tokubetsu jōnin, to say the least." Danzō said calmly, continuing without an ounce of hesitation, "You are only a Chunin and there are things that your rank doesn't allow you to command. The Uchiha Clan will never be recognised as a noble clan unless its leader is strong, and the clan will never be reborn unless the new leader can step out of the shadows of the previous one."

See, this was the reason why I found him irksome. He said it so calmly and so mellowly, but every one of his words was a knife that stirred up turmoil in my head. _Why in the world would I need something as artificial as ranks when I'm in Anbu._ His last sentence was simply genius and ruthless at the same time, bringing up my father and Itachi at a time like this. Incompetent, maladjusted, inexperienced, hopeless … those were what people were thinking when they called me a clan head. The 'shadow' of my father's leadership and the 'shadow' of Itachi's atrocious actions, he was just asking what everyone else was thinking: Can the Uchihas still be saved? Double entendre, a politician's true friend.

Subtly, I glanced at the Hyūga Clan head beside me. This man had once helped me to keep the Uchiha compound despite the feud between our clans. He stared back at me with no hint of wanting to help. I supposed that I would have to come up with an answer myself. Besides, why would he when he was also trying to test me? At least he had the decency to look me in the eye with a clear answer.

"You are correct, Elder Shimura. But I wonder, are there really dark shadows, or did someone just turn off the light and forgot to turn it back on?" I answered with another innocent smile. Metaphor, it was my best friend at the moment. _Butt out of my life - no, the Uchiha business, you are not welcomed. You do not get to judge whether my brother's actions are stains to the Uchiha name or not._

"Someone? As in who?"

"I was just speaking metaphorically, Elder Shimura. I'm afraid that you will have to forgive me if my philosophical insights are not profound enough."

He wasn't fooled by my innocent gaze, just like how I would never believe in his harmless demeanour. Shimura Danzō stared at me for an awfully long period of time, then without another word, he walked away.

 _Wait, that's it? He's just going to come, insult me, and then walk away? Is there a point to his actions?_

"There is some truth in his words. Despite how superficial it is, the rank does matter, especially if you are dealing with people who don't know the details of the shinobi system - which I assure you, will happen quite often. In order for the Uchiha Clan to be recognised, its clan leader must be in the rank of jōnin." The Hyūga Clan head spoke beside me, "You would probably have a quicker promotion if you rejoin the normal shinobi force."

"Thank you for the warning, Hyūga-san, I will keep that in mind." The thanks were genuine on my part. Hyūga Hiashi nodded his head slightly to acknowledge my thanks before walking away with the young Hyūga heiress.

Little Hinata trailed behind him, following her father from a safe distance. She looked back hesitantly in my direction with curiosity and shyness at the same time, before she turned around and dipped her head low. One day, she would probably be in the same position as me, dealing with choices in life that reach far more than her own survival. Now, that was something I needed to get used to.

 _Oh, this is going to be a long night. Dad, Mom, am I even doing this right?_ There were more people in the room examining me now, scrutinising my looks, attitude, and actions, each with agendas of their own. Some were actually walking towards me, hoping to get a sense of the newest mystery in the room. It wasn't long before I realised that the answer would never come to me if I just stood there lost in my own dilemmas. Instead, I just marched into the arena and hoped for the best.

"It is an honour meeting you. My name is Uchiha Maiko."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I sat on the sofa bed that I bought a year ago. It wasn't anything fancy, pull the back side down, you get a bed; pull the back side up, you get a couch. Since I usually just crash in the Anbu locker room most of the time, I rarely come back anyway. Still, the sofa bed was much more comfortable than Shun's dingy couch, even though my own bed (which Sasuke graciously occupied) would still be better. I paid for two-thirds of the rent because Shun argued that technically three people lived here and I wasn't stupid enough to argue with him for money, but _really_ , all I get is a sofa bed?

The sofa bed was a couch right now since there were a few things I wanted to get done before I fell asleep. However, seeing that the gathering had gone on until eleven and how it wasn't until midnight that I actually got out of the suffocating kimono, I sincerely doubted that I could get any sleep today.

The paperwork rustled under my touch; bills, account balances, they were all about the Uchiha Compound, the place I abandoned years ago. Sasuke was sound asleep in the next room. Two more years and he would be out of the Academy. As his sister, I did want to finish taking care of all this before that happened.

With the light scraping sound of the pencil against the paper, the door to the apartment opened. Shun stepped into the apartment and placed his bag on the rack by the door, where my black body bag was. After giving the black body bag a strange look, he walked towards the table covered with stacks of paper and sat down on the side across from me.

"Rare sight seeing you here. May I assume that you are going to spend the night here?" He asked, keeping his voice low so that it wouldn't wake up the ten-year-old on the other side of the wall.

"Probably, I _did_ buy the sofa bed myself, so I might as well use it." I shrugged my shoulders lightly, still keeping my eyes on the stack of paper, "Besides, I've been coming back more often recently, so I don't think you should complain."

"That's only because Hatake locks the locker room more often nowadays. What are you doing?" He picked up the piece of paper I had been writing on only a second ago and eyed it curiously.

"And that's the estimated price for repairing the roof. I need that, thank you very much." Immediately, I snatched the piece of paper out of his hand and returned it back to the pile.

"Roof? As in where?" Shun asked with a hint suspicion in his voice.

"Not here, if that's what you are worried about. It's for the Uchiha Compound. I haven't touched it for three years so the roof has to be replaced first before anyone can live there." Quickly, I circled the price in the midst of small words introducing me to different types of roofs.

"Why are you repairing it all of a sudden after all these years?" He asked lightly and I put down my pencil.

"Well, I own it, do I need another reason?" I said as Shun surveyed my carpet of papers filled with advertisement and numbers.

"From a philosophical standpoint, I suppose that you don't. However, financially speaking, if you are going to throw your life's saving into a sketchy real-estate investment, then it's probably better to make a pro-con chart first," he said joking, but the metaphor worked pretty well in my situation. Just for the sake of having something fun to do, I flipped that flyer from the roofing company and started to write something down.

"Here, the pro-con chart, as per your order." I placed the page in front of him.

"Let's see. 'Con: too many to name so let's just skip over them' … You know, that's not how a pro-con chart works." He threw me a criticising glare, but I just signalled him to continue. "'Pro: I'm just taking back what's mine'. Hmm, so you are looking at this from a philosophical perspective." Slowly, he put down the piece of paper and stared at me, deep in thoughts.

"Sorry, I should have told you this earlier. Our lease will expire in a year and I don't know what's your plan after that. I thought, Sasuke would want to go back someday and I can't just leave it like that forever. It doesn't matter what has happened there, it's still our home. Maybe, after I fix it, Sasuke and I can move back." Cons: money, emotional turmoils, responsibilities … there really were too many to name. However, for some reason, I never thought that I couldn't get pass them. Perhaps it was just an intuitive confidence.

"However, I do want to know how you think of it. I don't want to make decisions that will force changes on you when you are not prepared," I confessed, while the light sound of pencil tapping against the wooden table drowned out any suspended thoughts.

"Six years, has it really been that long?" He asked, and I just shrugged my shoulders lightly. "I suppose that compared to your problems, mine are easy. All I have to do is go rent out another place, preferably somewhere closer to work, without a moody ten-year-old nearby. But I wonder, are you doing this for said ten-year-old, or for yourself."

"That's a stupid question. I wouldn't be the same 'me' without considering for Sasuke. Sasuke is the clan leader, or he will be. He will rebuild the clan and reclaim the Uchiha name, and as his sister, all I can do is to pave the path for him." I answered immediately without an ounce of doubt. To be honest, this lifestyle had to change. I want an actual bed, not just four square metres of the living room and a sofa bed to call my bedroom.

"I still think that you are coddling your little brother too much. He's not a greenhouse orchid, but he's far from the resilient dandelion. Right now, he's more like a dethroned prince, and our prince needs to learn to live like a peasant. I'd say make him do the roofing, painting, and gardening for the compound. This way, you only have to pay for the raw materials," Shun argued like a true economist. I would admit, it was quite tempting albeit the fact that it was unrealistic.

"Yes, Sasuke is impatient, temperamental, and judgemental, I will give you that. But he is also determined and quick at learning. His flaws can be corrected with time, but he can't do everything by himself. One day, Sasuke will learn the things he needs in order to rebuild the clan, and I am not leaving him with nothing. I will give him a foundation he can work on," I said as I tapped the pencil down on the floor plan of the Uchiha Compound. "This place contains our history and heritage, a perfect gift for saying 'I believe in you', don't you think?"

"Sure, but you forgot to add the taxes. The same goes for the prices of repairing the windows, the floors, and the doors. Poof, there goes your salary." Whoa, way to ruin the moment. I rolled my eyes before shoving the papers towards Shun.

"You do it then, since you are so good at anything money related." I looked at him expectedly. After a few seconds of the staring contest, he gave up and picked up the pencil begrudgingly. Friendly exploitations happened quite often in this apartment.

"It's funny, for this whole day, all I could think of was how annoying and troublesome this whole clan thing is. I hate doing it, but I did it anyway," I muttered while resting my head on the tabletop. "It's not that I couldn't get out of it; I know that I made a choice. An unexplained motivation, perhaps; definitely something contradicting."

The rhythmic sound of pencil pressed against the rough paper murmured in the background for a while, before I heard Shun spoke up: "Trust me, I get that feeling a lot."

"So, what does that make us? Masochists, hypocrites, adults?" I asked.

"Dreamers. I prefer the word 'dreamer'; it has a much more positive connotation," he answered as he finished up the last bits of calculation for the roofing price. "So, did anything interesting happen today?" I raised an eyebrow at his sudden inquisitive attitude. There was something fishy about the way he sipped his tea as if he were waiting for some gossip.

"Well, I got a marriage proposal today." I waited for exactly one second before holding up a sheet of tissue paper in front of him, just in time to hear the violent coughs that were loud enough to wake the entire neighbourhood.

"You really need to give warnings next time before you say something like that." He squeezed out the words between broken coughs. However, it seemed that he was quick to realise that I was just messing with him because he crumpled up that sheet of calculations and threw it at me in retaliation. "So, who's the unfortunate guy?"

"A five-year-old. I doubt that he actually understood the implication of his words. So I directed him to a plate of mochi and we never saw, and never will see, each other again."

"..."

* * *

A/N: Confession time: remember Shun's comparison to Orchid and Dandelion, yeah, there's actually a psychology theory about psychological resilience to traumatic experiences in the environment. Orchids can bloom into spectacular flowers, however, they are sensitive to changes in the environment, but dandelions can pretty much survive anywhere. Interesting stuff one can learn from school...


	32. Chapter 32 - Daydreams

A/N: lol, this week has been hectic! So this chapter is a bit different from usual. It has four sections, and they happened around the same time (give or take a few days), but not necessarily in the chronological order. This is like a special chapter that I have always wanted to try, but the narration pov will go back to normal the next chapter.

* * *

Chapter 32 - Daydreams

#1: What Sasuke really thinks about his sister's choice of friends.

It was not the first time that Sasuke wasn't paying attention to his teacher's lessons, and he really doubted that it would be the last, considering he had two more years of Academy to get through before he could graduate.

Iruka-sensei was teaching the basics of replacement techniques to the rest of the class, the technique which he had already mastered a year ago. Truly, he saw no point in continuing his education in this place, even if they had a thousand excuses related to standards or procedures. The only reason he wasn't skipping classes every other day was because of his sister, his Mai-nee-chan.

She would be saddened if he had caused any trouble, yet he still did so. Burning down the training ground, electrocuting Shikamaru's koi pond, those were all over the top accidents that he had caused over the years. He would never admit this, but he had always been secretly hoping that Mai-nee-chan would run to him, even if all she's going to do was glare at him angrily.

Sasuke supposed that he was being rather harsh on his sister, it wasn't her fault that she had to leave, that she had to work busily in order to support him. No, it was all _that person's_ fault. It was because of _him_ that everything was destroyed; it was because of _him_ that his Mai-nee-chan was smiling with a hint of lingering sadness.

He remembered all of them. The forced smiles she gave him right after the massacre, telling him that she would take care of things despite the heavy veil of sorrow that draped over her eyes. The desperate smile she had on her face when she showed him the Mangekyou Sharingan.

In the end, Sasuke couldn't tell her, couldn't call out on the fake smile his sister used as a mask. She was already exhausted from her endless string of missions. Even though her placement in Anbu was supposed to be a secret, she never tried to hide it in front of him. Sometimes, those whispers at night when she thought he was sound asleep told him more than he should know.

 _Whispers, I hate them._ The last time his father and the other clan members whispered around him, it was right before the massacre.

"Teme! What are you staring at! The class is over!" Sasuke had never felt this much annoyance before, but that dobe managed to break his limit every time. Sasuke swatted that ball of blond hair out of his view and marched out of the Academy. That usuratonkachi could never know of his small blank out, or he would never hear the end of it.

"Hey, Sasuke! Don't just ignore me!" Naruto quickly caught up to him, despite his desperate hope of being left alone.

"Hn." He grunted because he didn't want to deal with Naruto, but all that got him was an angry war cry. The dobe launched for him like a badly aimed kunai, trying to get him through a surprise attack. Sasuke dodged Naruto's attack with ease. Seriously, he didn't know what happened to all his sister's training, seeing as the usuratonkachi was forgetting every one of Mai-nee-chan's warning on "don't attack your enemy from the most obvious positions while making loud and unnecessary noises".

"Teme, don't just give me that 'hn'! Isn't today your birthday? Can't you be a decent human being for just one day of every year?" Facing Naruto's accusation, Sasuke only glared at him. However, he did stop shooing Naruto away as the dope finally caught up to him.

His tenth birthday, probably the day he had been looking forward to the most in the past month. It wasn't that the day had any symbolic significance or anything childish like that; it was just that if he took it seriously enough, then his Mai-nee-chan would definitely take the day off to be with him.

"Hey, dobe, since you are invited to the meal, you better have something for me." For a lack of better words, Sasuke decided to say something that could potentially stimulate a conversation - or end one. _It's only because he is Mai-nee-chan's wannabe pupil that he is invited,_ Sasuke kept on telling himself. No way in a million years would he ever admit that he wanted the dobe to be there at the celebration. Never.

"Definitely! You are gonna have to wait to find out, but it's going to blow your mind! Dattebayo!" Despite Naruto's attempt to be secretive, somehow, he pulled out the pack of ramen coupons hidden in his jacket and flung it around excitedly. With one unimpressed look from Sasuke, Naruto reverted his attention to his outstretched hands and muttered an 'oops' along with a few embarrassed laughs. _Why am I not surprised that it's something ramen related?_

With a sigh, Sasuke walked back to the apartment with Naruto trailing behind. It was a path he was very familiar with, considering that he has been living there for the past three years. For a lack of better words, he had nowhere else to be. It was bad, but it couldn't be _that_ bad, he had once told himself. However, he miscalculated. He forgot one person, Yamanaka Shun.

He had never thought much about his sister's teammate anyway, he was just a random nobody his sister hanged out with occasionally, but Sasuke didn't like him. He wouldn't say that he hated him because the word 'hate' could ever only be associated with that one person.

Why didn't Sasuke like Yamanaka Shun? Perhaps it was envy; or maybe it was jealousy, Sasuke couldn't care less. He knew better than anyone else that negative emotions would never need any rationale behind them. He wasn't his sister; he didn't have her level of anger management.

Surprisingly, the apartment was empty when he arrived. With a quick survey around the living room, Sasuke saw the note his sister had left on the table: _Out buying food, be back in ten minutes._

He was totally planning to just sit there and wait, like a nice, responsible brother. However, when he saw Naruto already sitting on the couch, looking bored as always, he decided that he wasn't going to do the same. Instead, his eyes landed on one of the closed doors - Yamanaka Shun's room, to be specific.

"Okay, you've got that look saying that you are going to electrocute something just because you can," Naruto yelled in the background, but like usual, Sasuke ignored him. Without an ounce of shame, he pushed open the closed door and entered the room that wasn't his.

"Whose room is this?" Like a creepy gust of wind, Naruto mumbled from behind him, sending a chill down his spine. It seemed that the dobe's short-lived sense of justice was quickly replaced by curiosity. Typical.

 _A random nobody,_ Sasuke wanted to say that, but then he realised that it probably wasn't the best thing to say for the sake of his sister's reputation. "An old teammate of Mai-nee-chan," he replied after much contemplation.

The room was neat - very neat. Everything was organised and placed where they were supposed to be, save for a t-shirt thrown on the bed randomly. _Disorganised, bad habits, I see,_ Sasuke noted mentally. The size of this room was the same as his, but it somehow looked smaller due to the fact that there was more stuff.

"Hey, teme, look!" By now, that dobe had completely forgotten the fact that they were invading someone's privacy. He was pointing towards a picture on the desk, situated in the middle of all the notebooks like a prized relic. Four people were in the picture - three children and one adult. These people, without a doubt, were Mai-nee-chan's genin team.

"Your sister looked so small and cute back then!" _Naruto, stop talking so I can punch you._ "So, which one is the 'old teammate'?" With his curiosity stirred up by Naruto's question, Sasuke looked closer at the outdated photo. The black haired girl, the orange-blonde boy and the brown haired kid.

 _That person_ wasn't in the photo, so this must be his sister's team before the brown haired boy had died. _Good, because I will make sure to burn everything with his trace._

"That one." Sasuke pointed at the light-haired boy in the middle dispassionately. The much younger Yamanaka Shun was smiling in this photo. However, Sasuke could tell that his polite smile never reached his eyes. But then again, his own sister didn't even bother to put on a smile.

As the dobe marvelled over the picture, Sasuke looked around, hoping to find more dirt. Carelessly, he pulled out one of the notebooks from the shelf. Who knows, maybe the Yamanaka was a pervert. He refused to believe that the guy was squeaky clean.

' _Observational study on the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder using modified mind-body transmission technique and therapeutic genjutsu in comparison to the traditional drug treatment - an analysis of long-term effects for patients and jutsu users'_

 _What …?_ It was difficult for Sasuke to admit that even after four years of his academic career, he still couldn't understand the title.

Unfortunately, before he could flip the first page, he heard the apartment door being knocked open. There was no time to put everything back and get out without being caught, not that Sasuke cared. However, Naruto's number one rule for pranks was that he must try his best to hide after doing something mischievous, even though he knew that he would inevitably get caught. So, before Sasuke could protest, the usuratonkachi flopped him on the floor and dragged him under the bed while Sasuke still had that notebook of the observational study on whatever in his hands.

Sasuke wasn't the type to give up even though it was completely dark under the bed. He activated his Sharingan and continued to read on while two sets of footsteps sounded down the hall, walking past the room and all the way into the kitchen.

"I knew it. He's a stalker." Sasuke couldn't help but whisper. To be honest, he didn't understand every word, but he got the gist that this notebook was filled with observations on other people. And that was sufficient evidence that Yamanaka Shun was a stalker.

"Yeah, sure. The guy's got a few dirty socks under his bed, who cares? You need to lay low on the paranormal." _Paranoia,_ Sasuke wanted to correct the dobe so badly, but before he could, he saw two feet just visible outside the slit.

"You do know that I'm a sensor, right? Next time, when you're considering breaking and entering, might want to tone down that chakra a bit." Feeling disappointed, Naruto crawled out with a pout. However, Sasuke felt no remorse when he rose from the ground with dignity.

"What's this?" Sasuke asked accusingly as he held out the notebook all the way up for the tall man to see. Yamanaka Shun squinted his eyes at the evidence with confusion before taking the notebook for a closer look.

"Something you shouldn't have the access to. It seems like you have the same tendency to ignore any form of rules just like your sister." Perhaps Shun thought it was funny, but Sasuke didn't.

"Why, because it's your stalker diary?" Sasuke continued to press on, but the other man just gave him a weird look.

"You mean 'clinical observations'. Seriously, learn the jargon before you start making up names," Shun responded, unimpressed. Just then, his sister walked in and suddenly, the impending conversation was halted.

"What are we arguing about today? Let me join in," she said jokingly. It seemed like she was in a good mood today (despite the cutting knife in her hand) and just that fact made Sasuke happier.

"Your brother broke into my room, stole my research report, and accused me of being a stalker." _He deserves it,_ Sasuke thought silently as Mai-nee-chan gave him a look that asked "really?"

"Well, your hobby does make you sound like a stalker. Honestly, I cannot understand why you got that psychiatrist's licence." When his sister saw Shun's stormy face, she added immediately, "Kidding, kidding, at least you don't judge my life choices."

Sasuke could never understand how these two became such close associates. Mai-nee-chan was a front-line fighter; Yamanaka Shun was a sensor whose combat capabilities would never match that of his sister's. His sister detested anything to do with mental health, therapy and psych evaluations; this guy took on psychology research (or so he said) as a side job aside from his shinobi career. They bickered and threw insults at each other all the time, yet, they were friends - a word so harmonious that Sasuke wanted to gag.

Ah, perhaps, he was envious of Yamanaka Shun.

"Come on, you two troublemakers, out." His sister pointed at the door, but Sasuke stood his ground. "There's mochi on the table," a second later, Naruto betrayed him, "and freshly bought cherry tomatoes." Another second later, he betrayed himself.

As they munched on their respective snacks, Sasuke stared at the pair currently cooking at the counter. Sasuke liked his sister's cooking. It wasn't anything fancy, nor was it anything like his mother's. Simple, practical, straightforward, that was what his sister's cooking tasted like, but Sasuke liked it.

He frowned as he continued to observe the scene in the kitchen. They were just so in sync with each other. When Shun reached up for the soy sauce in the cupboard, his sister ducked down slightly without being told to. When his sister left to check on the rice, the guy instinctively took over the stir fry for her. There was no need for words, it was like they just knew what to do in the presence of each other. Unlike the polite smiles they had in that picture, Sasuke knew that now, the smiles reached their eyes. The more he thought about that, the moodier he became.

"Dude, why are you all angry and annoyed? Not that you are any different from usual." Sasuke gave Naruto an intense stink eye, who was probably so used to it already.

Sasuke wasn't afraid to admit that he thinks that the only person worthy of his Mai-nee-chan's generosity was him. In fact, how could she be so trusting of someone like Yamanaka Shun, or just anyone for that matter, after what had happened?

Perhaps, it was envy; or maybe, it was jealousy; but above all, it was paranoia. If someone of their own blood could betray them; if someone whom they had entrusted their hearts with could destroy everything, then how could there be any hope that this Yamanaka Shun wouldn't betray his sister?

The rest of the day passed with no hitches nor any more craziness, and Sasuke was content. He was always content when his sister came home and took the day off just to be with him. Because he still had the Academy the next day, his sister sent him to sleep at eleven, still a bit early in his opinion, but nevertheless later than what she would have usually allowed him. However, he couldn't fall asleep right away, not after what had happened with the massacre. It always took him an hour or so before he could fall into the tranquil state of dreaming, and he suspected that this was why Mai-nee-chan always urged him to go to bed early, despite his unwillingness to follow through with it.

It was a minute past midnight when Sasuke heard the whispers again.

Sasuke got out of the bed as quietly as he could, hiding his presence and movements just like he was trained to do. When he actually got to the door and peeked through the small opening, he was surprised that the one his sister was whispering to was not Shun, but some silver-haired man he had only ever had a blurred image of.

"When you said that I could have the 'day' off, you really were taking the literal meaning." Sasuke couldn't see his sister's expression, but from her bland tone, he could imagine that she wasn't all that enthusiastic about this man's arrival. "So, what brings you here personally?"

"Mission. I was supposed to tell you three hours ago, but I had to help an old lady find her way back home since it's so dark outside. So now, you only have half an hour to prepare, I suggest you get going." The man said it so nonchalantly despite his ludicrous words. Suddenly, Sasuke understood why his sister wasn't very happy about seeing him. _Does anyone actually believe that?_

"Whatever you say…" His sister let out a sigh. _Apparently, nobody believes that._

"So, what's the mission this time?" His sister asked in a hushed whisper. Sasuke wished that she didn't have to do that, he wanted to tell her that there was nothing he couldn't hear, that there was nothing she should hide from him.

"You're going to have to wait to find out, seeing as you have a little eavesdropper here." With a slight turn of his face, the man locked eyes (well, just one eye) with Sasuke, who was a bit startled and disappointed. With a breeze of wind, the man disappeared out of the room, leaving his sister to gather up her weapons in preparation for her upcoming mission.

Before Mai-nee-chan left, she waved him goodbye. She didn't seem very angry at him for eavesdropping; perhaps, she had always known of his habits. Reluctantly, Sasuke crawled back into his bed. _Five years, she promised. Now, three years have passed._ He really, really didn't want to remember that, not after how he saw his sister finally settle down in life; not after his sister finally felt like she had built a life together.

If he could, he really didn't want to bring up anything that could shatter this fragile peace his sister had worked so hard for. _But I can't. I can't stop the hatred, I can't stop the need for revenge. I can't forget the cruelty and atrocity_ he _committed. I just can't._

Two more years, he could still give her two years like he had promised. He didn't know what his sister was trying to find or prove, but he was willing to trust her until the world ends.

 _Two more years, Mai-nee-chan, if you still can't accomplish what you wanted to do, then let me do it for you. Two more years, then it will finally be my turn to protect you._

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

#2: What Shun really thinks about the apartment pricing these days.

For Yamanaka Shun, there were very few things that could truly get on his nerves. Call it a professional trait or something, but when you work at the Intelligence Division and you deal with unwilling 'information providers' every day, it was hard to get riled up. However, there were two things that could really get on his nerves: the ever-rising apartment pricing, and a certain temperamental ten-year-old who just didn't seem to know the importance and necessity of being polite.

The former of his problems, he had to admit he had no control of. Apartment prices went up like it was high on adrenaline, then it dropped like a hangover after the high. He was lucky to haggle down the current rent he had, but unfortunately, the contract will be expired in a little less than a year. So, as preparation for the future, he had to get back into the apartment market to scout for places. Some may call him to be overly obsessed with money, but he would say that it's the basics of survival. After all, a good bargain requires thorough preparations.

The latter of his problems, however, was something he would be rid of soon. This made him wonder, how the hell did he contract that particular problem in the first place, because clearly, he had many chances to say 'no'.

But you see, Shun didn't, for that Uchiha Maiko was the single biggest contradiction in his life.

Talented people often have charisma - a weird thing that draws people to Maiko instinctively. Fortunately, that wasn't the case with Shun. When he was first placed on a team with her, he was at best, courteous. She had many positive traits, sure, but that was it. She was so distant and unrelatable that she felt like a myth instead of a person. And Shun, who had always had a knack for psychology, preferred to study humans rather than a stone wall.

But that had changed since that fateful day. No, it wasn't the day that Daichi had died; it was five days after that - the day of Daichi's official funeral.

No shinobi was to be invited, that was what Daichi's parents had told them. So no one on his team could go pay their final respect. Shun had been angry about that, so he was sulking on the training ground, wearing black clothes, yet having no reason for it. Then, Maiko showed up. Black shirt, black pants, black jacket, she looked no different from usual, except for the single daffodil in her hand. Interesting choice of flowers.

Without the single word, she dragged him away from the training ground. It wasn't until a few minutes later that Shun had realised where she was taking him - Daichi's funeral. They weren't supposed to be there, Akira-sensei made it clear that they shouldn't do anything that would worsen the conflict between shinobis and civilians. However, Shun didn't protest when Maiko placed the doorman in a genjutsu and walked right in.

They sat in the back row and watched Daichi's body - cleaned and dressed - being sealed in the casket. At one point, Shun was sobbing in sorrow and anger. However, Maiko didn't shed a single tear. She kept her eyes on the body until the casket was carried away to be buried.

When they were following the hearse to the burial site, Shun had asked her why she had come here. Without even looking at him, she answered: "You wanted to come here, didn't you?" Yes, he did. He needed a chance to say goodbye, to properly greet the death that had taken his teammate so unexpectedly.

After the funeral was over, they stayed at the burial site for a little while longer so that Maiko could place that daffodil on the freshly made grave - 'Tokugawa Daichi, beloved son', they should have put 'brave shinobi' on there as well - Shun had asked Maiko again, "Why did you come here?" This time, she gave him a different answer.

"Did you know, the fastest way to evolve my kekkei genkai was to experience traumatic emotions. The Sharingan feeds on negative emotions, and the sorrow of losing someone close is its favourite dessert. After Daichi's death, nothing has changed with my Sharingan. Nothing. I was abhorred by myself, so I came here to see if I am really a monster."

"And are you?" Shun had asked for the last time. She never gave him an answer, but she didn't need to, because Shun could clearly tell from that moment that she was, without a doubt, a human.

Uchiha Maiko was a huge contradiction. She repels people, but then she attracts people. Over the years, Shun had learned that she could be the most caring person towards her brothers if she felt like it. Uchiha Itachi, the man who had betrayed her trust, was the prime recipient of her affection. And from what Shun could see, she gave him all of it.

This was why Shun despised Uchiha Itachi (not that he ever really liked him that much): he destroyed everything Maiko trusted, smashed it all to pieces, and forced her to carry the heavy pieces as each broken shard stabbed her until rivulets of blood flowed down her skin.

 _Right, back to the apartment pricings,_ Shun thought bitterly as his eyes flitted over to the package full of information stuffed in his bag. Yes, he did use some resources from the Intelligence Division to analyse the direction in which the apartment rents would be going for the next one or two years along with lots of other details that could only be accessed through the Intelligence Department database. And no, he did not feel guilty about it, because like he said, basics of survival.

Shun looked at the clock, it was only nine o'clock in the morning, and he was already having a headache. He supposed that he should get ready for the mission at noon. Despite common beliefs, people in the Intelligence Division do take missions, although definitely not on the same level of craziness as his roommate's. Shun had long accepted that his path would be different from Maiko's, and any comparison at this stage would simply be pointless.

However, he still thought that the rents were too high for a one bedroom apartment. It unsettled him and Shun decided to take a look at the report again. When he pulled out the first page from his bag, he immediately realised the reason why.

There were data of two-bedroom apartments mixed in the analysis.

At that moment, he wanted to smack his face for his own stupidity. _This is so ridiculous. I can't believe I didn't notice this._ _Well, I just wasted a perfectly good morning._ And like Shun had always believed: Time is money.

He guessed that it couldn't be helped. His perception towards Maiko could be summed up in two words: Admiration and curiosity.

Admiration, because Shun was also a shinobi and Maiko was the depiction of true strength and tenacity in his mind. Curiosity, because Shun came from a heritage that analysed human minds, and Maiko, with her cracked yet _still_ functional psyche, was truly a mesmerising case study to analyse.

Resilience, the ability to successfully adapt to trauma, social disadvantage or highly adverse conditions. It shouldn't be a surprise that the most investigated topic in the psychotherapy department was resilience. In the career of shinobi, resilience was the key to a functional life. What kind of shinobi village would Konoha be, if it didn't actively try to research on methods to build resilience?

As much as Inoichi-shishou liked to complain about Maiko as a difficult client to work with (Shun definitely knew this, since he was the prime recipient of his shishou's complaints), they both recognised what a valuable case study Maiko was, in terms of studying the mechanism and formation of resilience.

Shun had always considered himself as the observer; the impartial researcher who could stay out of the destructive spiral Maiko made. He wanted to claim that he could witness it calmly like an outsider, and therefore, he could be the sane one when everything regarding his friend was spiralling insanely out of control.

However, at that moment, when he begrudgingly thrust the papers back into his bag (even though he would like to burn the embarrassing evidence, paper costs money), he realised something: He was already swept up in the spiral the moment they became teammates nine years ago; already in the storm when they acknowledged each other as friends. It was arrogant and irresponsible of him to believe that he could still get out of this.

Ah, he supposed that the case study named 'Maiko' has just been invalidated - too many researcher biases and subjective emotions involved. After all, moving past all that admiration and curiosity, Maiko was, above all, his friend.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

#3: What Kakashi really thinks about stray puppies.

It could only happen so many times before Kakashi realised that whenever he was called into Hokage's office, it was usually about one of three topics: mission assignment, late mission report, or a stray named Uchiha Maiko.

So when he was summoned today, he thought back on any mission reports he might have forgotten to hand in and he couldn't remember any. It was at that point that he was sure that this was about either a new mission assignment or Uchiha Maiko, or maybe even both if he were lucky enough.

"Ah, Kakashi-kun, you came on time. Shikaku and I were just having a bet on how late you would be. It seems like we've both lost some money," the Hokage joked with a pleasant smile. Kakashi liked to defy people's expectation sometimes, it was always very amusing.

"Do you still remember that a month ago, I asked you to submit the names of potential candidates for captaincy from your team because we seem to have an influx of new recruits this season?" Kakashi nodded at the amiable man. He had submitted a grand total of two names. The first one, he had put down without thinking, but the second one, he only wrote it down after much debate.

"I believe that your first choice was Bear?" _Would you look at that, it's not topic number one, two, or three today._ Sometimes, Kakashi liked to have his expectations defied as well. "Well, I have evaluated his records and I have to say, he is indeed very impressive. If I remember correctly, he performed very well on his mandatory evaluation last month."

Every Anbu agent had biannual evaluations on their skills and strategies. They were usually given a team assignment in their capability and it was the only time that team captains like Kakashi get to sit back and let their subordinates direct the team, all the while judging them as harshly as they could (and every captain freaking loved doing it). It was a way of ensuring that these agents could think on their own when they return to the normal shinobi force, instead of being mindless puppets under the rigid Anbu power hierarchy. Of course, it was also a way for the Hokage to pick out potential captains.

Kakashi hadn't had a doubt in mind that Tenzō would pass with flying colours. He was a good choice for captaincy through and through and he was glad that the Hokage had recognised that.

"I have already talked to him and offered him a captain position. However, he seemed inclined to refuse. He told me that he was still searching for something and he asked me if I can give him more time to stay on your team." _Ah, that sounds exactly like him._

Tenzō would never directly refuse an order, so if the Hokage were to order him to be a captain, he would comply without further protest. Kakashi didn't know what his kouhai was searching for, but he had guessed that it had something to do with that cursed seal on his tongue.

It wasn't quite about the social stigma that Kakashi was afraid Tenzō would receive because supposedly, no one should know about Root. It was deeper than that. Tenzō had always had this internal shame about that mark on his tongue - a sign of betrayal to the Hokage. Perhaps, unless he could get rid of that brand somehow, he could never trust himself in taking on a position of power.

Kakashi thought that was just dumb. Reasonable, but still, dumb. Kakashi trusted him, and the Hokage obvious did as well. It was just Tenzō himself who couldn't see it. Perhaps it would go away with time, but to be honest, Kakashi wasn't sure that staying on his team was the answer.

He understood full well that for Tenzō, and perhaps Maiko as well, he was the safety umbrella. Problem number one with taking on strays with complicated pasts: you somehow become the saviour and get imprinted on.

Maybe one day, someone would come along, disband Root, and free them all. One could only dream. Shimura Danzō's Root was like an insurmountable and invisible barrier. Some people couldn't see the damage it was causing, others either didn't care enough to take it down or just couldn't. So all Kakashi could do was to defend against it, but never attacking it.

"Would you like me to talk to him, Hokage-sama?" Kakashi never liked to push people into doing things they didn't want to do. It was always better for Tenzō to realise this kind of things on his own; Kakashi was not a failsafe for psych counselling.

"If you would like to do so. However, he did promise me that he would take on the position most definitely after a year should he be needed, so I'm not too concerned." _Ah, that's good, this way, I don't have to boot him out myself to wake him up._ A year was a reasonable amount of time and whether or not Tenzō could find whatever he was searching for (Kakashi really hoped that he could), he would still be choosing to take on the responsibilities and moving on.

Wait a second, if the Hokage had already talked to Tenzō, then why was he called? _Uh-oh, damn it, so it's back to topic number three now…_

"So, for your second choice, you put down Rabbit, otherwise, known as Uchiha Maiko," the Hokage looked down curiously at the piece of paper which Kakashi had submitted.

Yes, Kakashi had put down her name as a second choice. Why? Because he couldn't find a reason not to, not a legitimate one anyway. However, he had never thought that the Hokage would actually skip to the second choice. _Maybe I should go talk to Tenzō right now …_

It seemed that the Hokage had realised his uncertainty, because he questioned, "Are you sure of your choice? Are you certain that you've thought this through?"

Now, this could go either way. It was certain that someone had to take on the post, so he could either say that he wasn't sure, and the Hokage would most likely ask Tenzō for the position again, or he could give his confirmation and let the Hokage consider her candidacy. Unlike Tenzō, Maiko would really be facing the social stigma. Her age, her last name, her past … No one wanted to see another Uchiha Itachi, who had been normal one day and a terrifying murderer the next.

Internal shame and external stigma, Kakashi detested them both. Tenzō and Maiko, they were strays with dark pasts, but they were still his strays.

"I'm not uncertain," Kakashi finally answered, albeit the fact that he had used double negative which gave a pretty uncertain impression. "She has all the objective requirements such as skill sets, strategies, and leadership mindset fulfilled. However, there are some subjective ones that I don't feel comfortable deciding."

"Let's hear your doubts, then," the Hokage proposed as if they were just gossiping over the tea. Perhaps, he was the one making this way too complicated. Strays, they were way too complicated.

"She lacks experience, three years is not very long," he voiced out the most fundamental problem.

"You were promoted after two years in Anbu if I remembered correctly. Besides, no one comes to a promotion with full experience, ready to go, not even you." _Well played, Hokage-sama._

"She …" _blackmailed me into giving her sensitive information._ Kakashi was pretty sure that this was one of the less legitimate excuses, so he changed his sentence half way. "... isn't the most mentally stable choice of the bunch." The Hokage raised an eyebrow at his lame excuse. To be fair, he felt like that most of the girl's problems were very relatable. So combined with the fact that he had pretty much been there and done that, he didn't particularly feel like judging her.

"Getting protective, I see." Kakashi swore that his eye just twitched at the Hokage's suggestive tone. "Shikaku has already pointed that out to me given her past traumas. However, Inoichi, along with us and the others, all agreed that it's not leaving a long term effect on her psyche that would influence her career. That or Inoichi has finally given up on her."

"She tends to make rash decisions when dealing with emotional situations," Kakashi tried again. This was one of the more legitimate points, or so he had thought.

"All of her previous assessments records are impeccable except for that one incident with Orochimaru, which I believe to be an exception under very rare circumstances." At this point, it was quite clear to Kakashi that the Hokage was having much fun destroying his arguments.

"However, you do bring up a valid point. She has a scheduled assessment soon, doesn't she? I've decided to reserve the decision after her latest mandatory evaluation. I even have a mission picked out for her already." The Hokage handed him a file folder which he took reluctantly. "All the standard evaluation protocols apply and only step in if she is about to fail. Please inform the rest of your team about the purpose of this mission, but tell Maiko-chan that it's one of the standard Anbu evaluations."

Kakashi opened the file, and immediately, he frowned. It was a relatively difficult A-rank mission, a bit challenging, but that wasn't why he had frowned. It was the location; a location that definitely fitted the purpose of this assessment well. _Truly, Hokage-sama, this is kind of mean._

"There's no need to give me that look. Shikaku was the one who chose it." As if reading his mind, the Hokage pointed towards the Jōnin Commander by his side who looked very disinterested by the blatant shift of blame. Of course, Commander Nara was never the kind to do things by half.

With a deep bow, Kakashi excused himself from the Hokage's office. As soon as he stepped into the hall, he let out an almost inaudible sigh. He wasn't usually the indecisive type, but when it came to the Uchihas, he had absolutely no idea what he was doing. In that sense, Tenzō just became his favourite stray.

"Don't worry too much about your subordinates. Look around you in Anbu, hell, even in the regular shinobi force, we all have some sort of psychological problem simply because it comes with our profession." Kakashi turned around immediately at the source of the voice, his eye settling on the laid-back figure of Commander Nara. He looked like he was delivering some documents for the Hokage, as he had a stack of files in his hands as he left the office.

"The judgemental looks were already on her path the moment she debuted as the new Uchiha Clan head, and she will need the rank to help her along the way," The Jonin Commander said in a relaxed voice as if they were just discussing the market price for kunai. "As for whether or not she can get it, it will be up to her, not you." The Nara Clan Head let the words trail off behind him as he walked away.

After standing there like an idiot for a few seconds, Kakashi decided that it was best to take another look at the mission first. When he opened the first page for the overview, he frowned even more. The recommended time for departure was 2200, but he clearly remembered that Maiko had asked for a day off in advance for her brother's birthday.

Well, he supposed that he could wait until midnight to get her and leave at one. Three hours, they could very well make up for that time on the road.

The Jonin Commander was right, everyone here who has been in a B-rank or higher mission had some sort of psychological problem; Tenzō and Maiko were just very unlucky and had a few more to deal with than usual.

Also, no more strays. Absolutely no more strays.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

#4: What Itachi really thinks about life as an S-rank missing-nin in a circle of international S-rank criminals.

Life as an S-rank missing-nin was definitely not filled with freedom and adventure, not that Itachi ever thought of it in such a romanticised way, considering that he himself had once made a living off of hunting the missing-nins until he was thirteen.

But that was almost three years ago, and since then, Itachi had already reached a conclusion that he often recalls nowadays: He chose this and there was no turning back. To say that he didn't regret his actions would be a lie, but it was just that the justification outweighed the regrets.

Peace, what he had always yearned for ever since he stepped onto that field of corpses at four as part of Father's lesson. He didn't and still couldn't understand why peace had to be fought with bloodshed and death.

Family, what he had always yearned to protect ever since he knew the existence of a baby sister. He had tried so hard to understand why the only way he could protect them was to hurt them and break them first.

Itachi had been called a genius or a prodigy all his life, but sometimes he felt like such as fool when it came to the things he cared about the most.

 _It was the only option. The coup d'état had to be stopped. Maiko and Sasuke had to be protected. Shisui gave his life to help me protect what's left of the clan, but I bet he never thought it would go this way._

Whose fault was it in the end? The Uchihas who wanted to rebel? The senile council whose distrust pushed the Uchihas to the brink of insanity? Shimura Danzō, who had issued the kill order under the Hokage's name, who took Shisui's eye and therefore took their only chance of reversing the coup peacefully? Or perhaps even himself, who obeyed the order and decided the final course of action on his own desire to trade the clan for his siblings' future.

From time to time during the last three years, Itachi would find the question to be painstakingly simple. They were all to blame, and thus none of them was to be blamed. Because this event was not caused by a single factor, thus there would be no point in establishing a cause and effect where one would simply just blame someone or something. The peace was maintained through this way. All were to be blamed, therefore none should be blamed.

However, other times in his life as a missing-nin, Itachi agonised over this question in order to justify his actions. He couldn't be content with that answer because the world didn't work in this idealistic way of thinking. People wanted to blame someone, and if none were to be blamed, they would simply find someone or something to be blamed.

 _So think, Itachi, which one should be blamed that would result in the smallest damage to the peace?_ It was Itachi himself. Maybe this was the justification he sought, or maybe he was already biased from the beginning of the deduction.

The murky air in the underground pub invaded Itachi's senses, threatening to overwhelm his consciousness. He had never been good at resisting the drowsy stench of alcohol, but he guessed that with enough time, he would get used to it eventually.

Despite the dim light that lit the room in a sinful colour, Itachi was not here to drink. When people say that most sinful places are connected, they were not wrong. This underground pub that sold alcohols to criminals and passersby all the same also provided bounty hunting for those who didn't want to earn a living the legal way.

"You gotta give me something that's worthwhile, and anything less than twenty million ryō is not considered worthwhile." Sitting beside Itachi, was a man covered from head to toe in cloth, only showing a sliver of his face that included his unusually coloured eyes. Like Itachi, he wore the long black cloak of Akatsuki decorated with red clouds. This man was Kakuzu, a member of the criminal organisation Itachi joined up shortly after he had massacred his clan.

"Look, it's not like I don't want to give you anything, but high-value bounties are hard to find. These are all the bounties over ten million ryō I have right now, pick whichever one you like." The bounty collector responded with exasperation as he placed a stack of paper in front of the impatient man. He was smart to walk away quickly before Kakuzu decided to kill him, but Itachi knew that if Kakuzu really wanted to kill the bounty collector, walking away would not help at all. However, if there was one thing that could keep Kakuzu from killing someone, it was probably money related.

"Be careful of what you pick, we want to finish the mission as soon as possible." On the other side of Itachi, a woman with short blue hair said emotionlessly. Itachi supposed that she, Konan, was probably the most normal person in the organisation, well, if one defined normal as being able to turn into papers at will. She didn't speak much, but when she did, it was usually about keeping the objective in mind.

"Trust me, I have been at this a lot longer than you, so just let me do my job, girl." With a murderous glare, Kakuzu sneered at Konan with contempt before he returned to his process of picking out the highest bounty in the stack.

Akatsuki's premise included mostly three parts from what Itachi had figured out. Get funds from high bounty missions. Gain the dependency of countries by offering them lower prices. Obtain the tailed-beasts. Right now, Itachi's mission was part one, and who was better for the job than Kakuzu, the self-proclaimed-and-objected-by-nobody treasurer of the organisation.

Itachi stared at the dark wall of the tavern as the silence persisted among the three of them. He was never a conversationalist, and to be frank, he believed that in an organisation of S-rank missing-nins, the best way to stay alive was to remain silent like some aloof king who kills everyone around them. _I wonder how Maiko and Sasuke are doing._ Not too well, probably, but they should be doing better than before.

Despite their silence, different voices chimed in the chatty background of the tavern. "Hey, have you heard, there is the risk of Konoha and the Land of Snow going to war?" A few tables away, a man said in a not so quiet voice. Itachi was never the gossip type and years of training had allowed him to have minimal reactions to almost anything that happened. However, it didn't mean that Itachi's interest wasn't piqued by the word "Konoha".

"Your information is outdated! Nothing's happening, no one will go to the war for a misunderstanding!" A few tables away from the bar where the Akatsuki members were currently sitting, a second man called out before he chucked a cup of sake down.

"Wait, what happened?" A third man joined in, looking a bit confused at the conversation, but that could also be because of the alcohol he was currently ravaging.

"Konoha and the Land of Snow apparently had some misunderstanding on the metal trade, but that's all sorted out now, unfortunately." The second man proceeded to answer with a hint of sarcasm in his voice. Itachi understood his desire for conflict; there were not a lot of jobs for missing-nin, but a bit of conflict and battle always opened up opportunities.

"Wait, that's not what I heard. They say that the Land of Snow attacked the Konoha diplomats and that's why everyone is pissed." The first man argued quickly but that just invited more debates to arise.

"Hang on, I heard that it was the Konoha shinobi who attacked first. Apparently, they slaughtered the entire Snow army before they left. Seriously, everyone saw it on the ship, they burned the whole coast into nothingness. Hellfire, they said." Suddenly, another voice yelled out from a nearby table. Soon, more than half of the tavern was debating on how the conflict started and how it was resolved. Gossip, one of the best ways to immediately turn a room of strangers into acquaintances. However, the problem was that no one actually knew what had really happened.

"Hah, I think that it's the Konoha who attacked first. They say that one of the shinobi they sent was an Uchiha. Who in their right mind sends an Uchiha for diplomatic missions unless they want to screw the country over with their dojutsu?" Over the chorus of arguments, Itachi vaguely picked out this sentence. _Now that's just not fair, putting 'Uchiha' and 'Konoha' in the same sentence._ Suddenly, Itachi felt very glad that Kisame - his new partner after the last one was killed during their last mission relating to the Yondaime Mizukage - wasn't here. That guy always liked to take a jab at his history of massacre, claiming that it helped with team bonding since he had also killed his fellow countrymen without any sense of guilt. Oh, and Kami forbids if Tobi were here…

 _That man, the most mysterious person in this organisation full of mysteries. He is an Uchiha, but what does he want? What does he hope to accomplish? And most importantly, is he really who he claims to be?_ His identity seemed so absurd that Itachi had had to go back to the drawing board multiple times and had still yet to reach a conclusion.

"Seriously, Uchiha? Haven't heard that name for a while."

"Everybody there swore that they saw red eyes, crimson like the colour of blood! Who else would it be but an Uchiha?"

"Nah, who cares? If there is a conflict, so be it. I need a few more jobs anyway and the one time that's never in shortage of manpower is a war…"

 _These strife-seeking people, that's why the world continues to revolve around war …_ Itachi only continued that thought for a second before he remembered that he was in no position to judge. He was a shinobi, be it in Konoha or in Akatsuki, and his life would always be filled with violence. This was the sad story of life, the one he and Shisui tried to get out of despite knowing that they could never abandon the way of the shinobi. It was ingrained too deeply into them the moment they were born with the Sharingans as Uchihas.

"Come on, we are going to move, next target is in the Land of Hot Springs. Apparently, our target killed everyone he saw, including all the previous bounty hunters. We take care of this, we get 18 million ryō, so try to get it done within five days." Suddenly, Kakuzu spoke up as he finally decided on a bounty. Itachi had no doubt he had just ripped out the highest one and only read the information afterwards.

Silently, Itachi got up and followed Kakuzu and Konan out of the tavern. The tables of criminals and passersby were still arguing, but their topic was already onto something other than Konoha and Uchiha.

Life as an S-rank missing-nin was definitely _not_ healthy on so many levels, but Itachi could argue that he had never been healthy, to begin with. Maiko and Sasuke, he wondered if they still held that immense amount of hatred like he expected? The last time he had talked to them, it was painful, very painful for all of them in all kinds of ways.

 _It's fine, though. I don't need them to be forgiving or merciful. I just need them to be safe._

* * *

A/N: yeah, as you can guess, the mission next time. Confession time: this chapter originally was only supposed to have the first three sections, because Itachi's section is kind of like an omake (yeah, it's going to take a while for him to resurface). However, if you look at the character tags I put on the story, you will realise that with Itachi, I've got all four characters covered in this chapter (kind of like reflective interludes), what an amazing coincidence! (XD, jk, don't hit me).


	33. Chapter 33 - Incendiarism

Chapter 33 - Incendiarism

"I'm sorry, what?" Despite the clear lack of respect in my voice, I was not actually being sarcastic. I was genuinely asking for a clarification since what I had just heard couldn't possibly be right.

"Did you lose your hearing as well? We don't have time for questions, we were supposed to be leaving three hours ago." Kakashi responded with a bland voice. _Yes, and whose fault is that?_

"Isn't my evaluation next month?" I asked again. Kakashi was a lazy person in terms of anything that did not fall under the 'necessity' category, which meant that he arranged these mandatory evaluations to be as late as possible. My six-month deadline wasn't due until three weeks later.

"Hokage-sama wants to do a full-scale review of Anbu agents in two months, so every member of this team needs to have their assessments done by then. I have to move up the schedule a bit and yours is next. Nothing's changed, all the standard evaluation protocols still apply and I will take over if you screw up." Kakashi added helpfully (or not really) before I continued my next sentence.

"And the mission is in the Water Country, where the Bloody Village of the Mist - which is currently still in a state of unrest - is located." This time, I said it with utmost sarcasm in my voice. Just from the mission overview, I knew this was a kind of sensitive mission that couldn't allow any screw-ups - the kind that wasn't usually used for evaluations.

"You've never been there before, have you? Think of it as an opportunity for tourism." Immediately, I glared at Falcon, who decided that making a joke was the best course of action at the current moment.

"I feel like there's something going on, but I can't tell what," I mumbled as I surveyed my teammates in suspicion. All of a sudden, everyone became really quiet and put on their best mask face - just without the masks.

"It's just the timing. All the evaluations have been moved up, and you're unlucky that this important mission coincides with your evaluation just before Hokage-sama decided to do a full-scale sweep." Beside me, Zebra explained in his usual calm voice, not showing any hints of deception. However, after my experience with 'the sake incident', I didn't think I could trust his seemingly truthful tone ever again.

"So if I mess up, my career in Anbu is over?" I asked with a light tone while hoping that the answer was no. However, the contemplating look Kakashi gave me was not helping with my confidence.

"Well, not necessarily, it totally depends on how badly you mess up. Think about it this way, if one of us lost a limb, then you would know that you really messed up." I looked at my captain incredulously. Sometimes I wonder if he knew how cold his jokes were.

"And all of you are okay with this?" I glanced around the room full of veteran Anbu agents, looking for any signs of confirmation or hesitation. I truly felt that leaving their lives in my hands in a very hostile foreign territory was not a smart idea. Even if this mission were just an evaluation, it carried the risks of any normal A-rank mission. We could only learn on the field, after all. However, what I saw around the room were smiles (even Bear, who rarely smiled just because it wasn't his personality) that warmed my heart.

"We always go on each other's assessments, no matter how easy or hard the missions are because we trust each other. This one is no different." Otter said as she let out a chuckle, and around her, all of my teammates nodded. _Okay, maybe this mission won't be that bad._

"I'll do the best I can, I promise," I said firmly, finally shaking off that hint of uncertainty in my voice. I held my right hand out towards Kakashi, silently asking for the folder that contained all the mission-related files. _I'm bringing you all back alive so that the past tragedy won't happen ever again._

"So, Rabbit, now that you are in charge, any words you want to say before we head off to the kill zone?" Falcon asked with a mischievous glint in his eyes as I took the mission folder from Kakashi. I thought in silence for a second before speaking the words that would later be known as my special kind of 'encouraging' battle cry.

"We are going to the Bloody Mist, so if we mess up, then it will really be a 'once in a lifetime' experience. So let's eliminate some targets and stay alive."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I glanced down at the files, scanning every single word and every little bit of detail as I went through them for the fifth time. Something was odd in this mission briefing, and considering the fact that I was back onto a ship again, I had quite a few hours to figure out what the hell was odd about this particular mission.

After flipping through the report one more time, I returned to the first page. Finally, I laid my eyes onto one particular name in the contact personnel column. _Yep, this was the odd part._

"This 'Terumi Mei', why is she on the file?" I asked the man beside me who was leaning idly by the deck rails. He wasn't paying much attention to me, though, seeing that his half-closed eye was glued to the pages of his book.

"What does your file say?" He answered me with a question without lifting his eye from the book.

"Not much. Kirigakure jōnin, that's it. It says that she is the information provider for this mission, but the question is why. No shinobi would willingly betray their village without a reason." See, here was what I didn't understand. Our target was a group of Kiri-nin that was a part of the pro-genocide faction, but other than that, there wasn't much information about it. Terumi Mei, on the other hand, had even less information. The only thing on her was the fact that she was a Kirigakure jōnin, rather than a missing-nin. The Hokage had ordered us to meet her for further information since for some unknown reason, she had commissioned the mission, and for some reason, the Hokage had agreed.

"It's not betraying your village if you don't even have a unified village, to begin with." Suddenly, Kakashi murmured beside me, "What do you know about the situation in Kirigakure?"

"The country is in a state of civil unrest ever since the Yondaime Mizukage ordered the genocide of all of those with Kekkei Genkai, and that the shinobi training in Kirigakure is especially brutal and ruthless. Anything you want to add, please do so now." I turned towards him and looked at him expectedly. Now that he had brought it up, he might as well finish the explanation.

"Ever since the end of the Third Shinobi War, the Yondaime Mizukage had been purging those with Kekkei Genkai, it was almost like a national sport. However, the village is split because of the Yondaime Mizukage's reign and policy, so right now, the civil unrest is not only caused by the terror of prosecuting the Kekkei Genkai users but also from the active fighting of rebellion groups that are against the Mizukage's rule. As for Terumi Mei, she and the Hokage-sama must have made a deal, or else we wouldn't be sent to the enemy territory." Kakashi replied calmly as he flipped another page of his precious book, it was as if none of this had anything to do with him, despite the fact that both of us owned the sharingan, a very distinguishable Kekkei Genkai.

"Is she trustworthy? If she is still a jonin in Kirigakure instead of being declared missing-nin, she must have been under the Mizukage's command. Why hire us to eliminate the pro-Mizukage faction?" I continued to question. This mission was important to me, not just because my career was on the line, but also my teammates' lives were at risk. I couldn't afford to make rash decisions with just limited information.

"That's for you to find out, isn't it? If you want to know what deals she offered, what motives she has, or whether or not she will keep her promises, then go find out yourself, it's part of the job of being a leader. I trained your intuition well over the years, so use it." He said it so nonchalantly that I just wanted to grab his novel and throw it into the ocean so he could at least pretend to look like he cared. However, the only thing I could do at that moment was to sigh. I supposed that this was the closest thing to a vote of confidence from him, ever.

"So we are going to the Bloody Mist to kill a dozen shinobi under the crazy Mizukage's rule, just because of a woman, who has a very suspicious background, suggested us to do so?" Sometimes, I felt like sarcasm was the only thing I could do.

"If it makes you feel any better, that dozen shinobi would gouge your pretty little eyes out and burn you at the stake." _If that were the case, then we have a very different definition of what's comforting and what's not._

"Let them try and see how it goes. Besides, if my eyes go, yours wouldn't be safe either." I shot back with a snort. The sea was calming and without a storm, but the vast blue body of water seemed to be fading into a grayscale the closer we got to Kirigakure. I wasn't quite sure if it was because of the shrouding mist or just my mood playing tricks on me.

"I can feel your heavy clouds all the way from here. It's your evaluation and you've done this before, it's no different from the previous ones." _No, I've never had a mission to Kirigakure before._

"It's hard not to be anxious when you have to pick up from where you fell down the last time," I whispered lightly, unaware of the fact that I had expressed my thoughts out loud. Daichi's death was still a sensitive topic for more than half of Team Ro, including me. The casket had been closed for eight years, yet I could still see that scene vividly as if it were only yesterday. I had long accepted the fact that it would never be forgotten as long as I still had a say in that matter.

I watched Kakashi stare at me with mixed emotions before he retreated back to his book. I didn't know why, but at that moment, I felt very irritated by the fact that I couldn't beat a _novel_ in gaining his attention even if we were on an important and dangerous mission.

"Why the hell would you bring that book? You know that it will most likely get destroyed in the fight even if I were kind enough not to throw it in the ocean." I muttered with annoyance written all over my face. This time, Kakashi didn't ignore me. Instead, after a moment of silence, he put his precious book back into his pocket with such care that one would think it was an ice statue instead of a shady novel.

"If any harm comes to my book during this mission because of your decisions, I'll automatically mark you as a fail." He said to me in a dangerously serious tone, and I had no doubt that he would do it. See, my career couldn't even beat a book in terms of importance.

"Thanks for the warning," I muttered begrudgingly. After a second of thought, I added, "Why don't we just change the primary mission objective to the protection of your, what was it? Limited edition of the third book bundled with extra scenes?"

"You could, but then you would really fail the evaluation. Also, it's the only the bookstore edition of the second book. Who in the world brings limited edition on a mission in a messed up country." I looked at him incredulously, only to realise that he was completely serious. _Huh, so you do know that it's a mess up country with the mortality rate shooting over the roof._

Shaking my head helplessly, I turned back to the ocean, letting the blue scenery fill my field of vision. Going on an island that was isolated by the sea had not been on my to-do list ever since the mission to the Land of Snow. The only consolation was that this time, the distance across the sea was shorter and there were several islands in between. _Well, you only learn from past experiences, and yes, I do have a lot of examples to learn from._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

' _Sensors, on watch.'_ I signed to Otter and Falcon as we approached the meeting destination. I didn't know if the other party also had a sensor or not, but I would take the safe approach and assume that they had one. So far, during our travel, we had seen three explosions, two dead bodies rotting on the side of the road and one skirmish between two opposing groups of Kirigakure shinobi. With no exceptions, we steered clear of all of them.

' _Foreign party approaching, three identified. They are not suppressing their chakra.'_ Otter responded with hand signs as I signalled the team to stop. _Not suppressing their chakra? They are either stupid, confident, friendly or all three._ I narrowed my eyes at the empty field in front of us as we crouched in the trees, trying to detect any signs of human movement within this desolated part of the forest.

' _They stopped moving, just on the other side of the clearing, must have a good sensor on their side as well.'_ Beside me, Falcon signed. Whoever chose this place for meeting knew what they were doing. The clearing was small enough that a sensor could cover the area with no problem but large enough that most ambushes from the forest could be evaded. Adding to the fact that this region of the Water Country was very desolated from the purging and fightings, it was the perfect spot to conduct a diplomatic meeting between two untrusting parties. _Now it is just a matter of who decides to take the first step._

' _Falcon, Bear, please go survey the surrounding forest, the rest are going to meet our guests with me.'_ I signed quickly to the rest the team as we dropped down onto the ground from the trees. The Kiri informants had been kind enough to show a sign of trust by not suppressing their chakra, and it just wouldn't be right if we didn't return the gift.

Cautiously, we walked into the clearing; just because we decided to take a step first, doesn't mean that we would let our guard down. Within five seconds, I saw the bushes across the clearing ruffle. Immediately, I caught three blurring figures jump out of the bush. My fingers tightened around my swords instinctively until I saw the three said figures land in the clearing as well, just a few meters before the four of us.

"Konoha-nin?" The woman that seemed to lead the trio asked in a cautious voice. The two men - one had an eyepatch while the other younger one clenched tightly onto his giant sword - also seemed very tense and cautious by our sudden appearance.

"Yes, and you must be Terumi Mei," I stated emotionlessly as I eyed the trio in front of me critically. The man standing a little to Terumi's left was wearing an eye patch, but his other visible eye darted around the surrounding forest. It didn't take a genius to figure out that he was the sensor of this group. _Now, when did eyepatches become a popular fashion statement?_

"Don't be nervous, some members of our team are surveying the surrounding forest. Just in case there are uninvited intruders." I remarked to the eyepatch man and he looked slightly awkward being caught in such a blatant act of distrust.

"Of course. Now, I'm going to assume that you are the speaker and that you know what you are being asked to do. I would like to talk to you about the details of the plan as well as what I can provide you in return." Terumi Mei said with a perfectly polite smile, but it didn't reach her eyes. Casually, she raised her arm and signalled for us to walk away from our individual teams. After a moment of hesitation, I walked after her to a position about twenty meters away from the main group.

"First of all, I would like to thank the Hokage for agreeing to my request." The woman said calmly, with the smile still plastered on her face. She was comfortable at this, it wasn't hard to tell that she dealt with people in high positions all the time. However, before she could continue, I cut her off quickly.

"Before you continue, let me remind you, Terumi-san, while Hokage-sama did hear your request, however, I will be the one to decide if the request is worth acting upon. Konoha will not be risking shinobi's lives based on unreliable information." Kakashi said that I could find out information on my own, and this was exactly what I planned to do.

"Oh? I am hurt to hear you say that, Konoha-nin, or should I say, Uchiha. Surely, you understand that the targets I am asking Konoha to eliminate are genocidal shinobi who won't blink an eye to kill people with Kekkei Genkai like you." She said with a newfound interest in her smile as she brought up her fingers and pointed at her eyes. _How the hell …_ See, this was the problem of having a unique physical characteristic that the mask couldn't hide. I swear, I only flashed the Sharingan for a brief moment while in the jungle, but somehow, she had caught that.

"I do, but that's not why I'm here. You see, I am here because Hokage-sama sent me here, but the real question is, why are you, a high-ranking jōnin under the Yondaime Mizukage's command, here?" I wasn't the type to drag this out unless of course, I was talking with Danzō. Terumi's smile turned into displeasure for a second before it finally disappeared and she placed one hand on her hip as her eyes ran over me judgingly.

"Didn't anyone teach you not to ask for a woman's secrets?" She said in a dangerous tone, but I just shrugged. "However, I suppose that some sacrifices must be made in order to gain help in this day and age. Indeed, I was under the Yondaime's rule for a long time, but I'm sure you will understand my motive once you see this. Now, don't be frightened."

I watched with curiosity as she brought her hands up to her mouth and turned her face away from me. She looked as if she were about to use Katon: Great Fireball, however, instead of a giant fireball shooting out of her mouth, it was sort of a molten material that immediately covered the ground and started to scorch it.

"Lava release, no wonder… you are a Kekkei Genkai user." _Amazing, I thought Kekkei Genkai users had gone extinct in this land._ Yet, she had somehow survived under the Yondaime's rule with a hidden Kekkei Genkai all the while gaining her Mizukage's trust.

"So, are you convinced now? Or do you want to ask for another secret?" She asked me mockingly as the ground continued to burn and melt under her lava release.

"Just one more thing, I want to confirm how you plan to make your promises come true, Konoha doesn't act on empty promises," I stated with a straight face, which wasn't hard considering I literally had the mask on. I actually had no idea what she had promised Konoha, but I had a feeling that the risk was worth it.

"Like I told your Hokage, now that the Yondaime is missing, his reign will fall apart quickly with the people's dissatisfaction. Once the extremists are gone, I can―" The woman started in a slightly annoyed voice, I could only imagine how much she wanted to finish this job as quickly as possible. However, in the middle of her sentence, she abruptly stopped herself and eyed me with anger. "You little brat, you didn't have this information before, but now you do."

Against her accusation, I just shrugged again. She didn't need to finish the sentence for me to figure out what she was aiming for.

She was aiming to become the Godaime Mizukage, and she would have a damn good chance of becoming one.

The people of the Water Country wanted the violence to stop after seeing the political and economic results of the Mizukage's reign. The only problem for her was probably the extremists who wanted to continue the Kekkei Genkai hunt. Terumi Mei needed them gone, but she couldn't openly start another purge, not when the whole country was already sick of the violence. I guess that she probably promised the one thing the Sandaime Hokage held as his ideology: Peace. Konoha was the closest village to Kirigakure, but Kiri had always been at war with Konoha in the last three Shinobi wars. With Terumi Mei as the Godaime Mizukage, Konoha might be able to finally establish a peace treaty with Kirigakure for the first time in decades.

I had no love for Kirigakure because they were the ones who had started this hunt for Kekkei Genkai; because it was a Kiri-nin who had killed Daichi. However, I had to give it to this woman, she was smart to figure out that the current Hokage had been the right person to contact. If someone like Danzō were to hear of this, then I was sure that we would be here for the assassination of Kirigakure leaders instead. Not everyone was nice enough to pass off an opportunity to destroy a village when its leader was missing. For one sinister moment, I sort of hoped that we were here for a different mission objective.

"Now that we are all clear, let's move on to the actual mission. Location, the number of forces, and the cleanup. Those are the resources you said you would be willing to provide, no?" I didn't want to respond to her accusation, so I just moved on to the next order of business.

"Their base is near this area, an hour's travel to the east. They have around twenty shinobi at their disposal, but I don't want you to kill anyone other than the five in charge whose information and portraits I have already provided to your Hokage. As for the cleanup, the Kiri-nin under my charge will handle it." She answered after a few seconds of silence as if she had finally figured that the previous exchange of secrets didn't really matter as long as the mission was done.

"You don't want us to kill more than the five, or is it an absolute need?" I asked out of the blue. At first, she furrowed her eyebrows at my question and didn't answer me, so I continued to speak. "As part of our agreement, the attack will not be traced back to you, but it cannot be traced back to Konoha as well. You can't expect us to turn a blind eye to any eyewitnesses." Surely, if the targets were surrounded by a tightly knitted pack, she would know that it was unrealistic to just single out the centre and ignore the others.

"I understand the necessity, but please do try to avoid that, we wouldn't want unnecessary people to be killed, do we?" _Too late for that in this period of time._ "We should return, your team seems worried." Without another word, she buried the signs of molten lava with a well-placed earth release before she walked back to the rest of the group whom we had left behind looking either very bored or very nervous. _Oops, maybe I pissed her off a bit too much?_

"Terumi-sama, is...is everything alright?" As we walked back to our teammates, the teenage boy with the giant sword asked shyly at Terumi Mei.

"Don't worry, Chōjūrō, I was just discussing the details with the Konoha-nin, and we are now more or less settled." She responded to the boy with a smile. _Well, I suppose that 'more or less' is a nice way of putting it._

However, before I could say anything to my team, there was a pillar of smoke that appeared a few kilometres away which caught all of our attentions.

"Is there anything located there, Terumi-san?" I asked quickly as I watched the smoke continue to rise without any sign of being put out. _That fire, it's too strong for any normal use like cooking._

"There are a few minor civilian villages in this area, but I don't know why it would be attacked, there are no known Kekkei Genkai users in this area," Terumi answered without hesitation. With one look at our respective teammates, we all realised what needed to be done. Soon, the nine of us were running at full speed towards the village that was burning in flames.

The village was being burned to the ground when we arrived at the scene. As we hid in the nearby forest untouched by the greedy flames, I watched ten shinobi drag a young girl away from her mother and attempt to push woman closer to the burning building as the child screamed past unrelenting tears. Those Kiri-nin, they were absolutely disgusting.

"Please, spare her! She is only a child! She doesn't know anything!" The woman wailed as a Kiri-nin kicked her away. The snake-like flame grazed her clothes, but no amount of heat could vaporise the tears on her face.

"Don't worry, both of you are sinners, monsters. I will make sure that you two can reunite in hell!" One of the Kiri-nin laughed with a sinister smile on his face. At this point, the child was already passed out from the intense heat. _How could he smile? There is no way they are doing this out of fear; I can see it from their sadistic smiles, they are doing this for enjoyment._

"Terumi-san, you said that you would be in charge of cleanup. So, do you mind?" I asked the woman beside me without actually turning to face her. One of the shinobi, the one that was holding the girl in his hand, was right out of the portrait supplied to us in the mission file. She hesitated, looking a bit torn at the situation at hand. I couldn't blame her indecisiveness, seeing that I was asking if she would be alright with us killing them all. She was a Kirigakure shinobi, and despite the fact that many Kekkei Genkai users had defected from the village, she was trying to salvage the remain and rebuild it anew.

"Of course, I will take care of it." A few seconds later, I heard the confirmation. _Now, that's the spirit._ Without further delay, I started to issue the orders.

"Zebra, please set up a defensive circle around the villagers with earth walls; Otter, Falcon, we are going to form a semicircle around the Kiri-nin and push them towards the flames, Zebra will join us after he's done. Bear, please get the kid out quickly and use wood releases to trap the shinobi. Hound, kill the main target when you have the chance." My orders were brief and concise; when fighting with multiple targets, closing in on them would severely limit their fighting space, but not so much for us. The civilians wouldn't be able to see what was going on within the earth wall, which meant we could use our jutsu without worrying about leaking our identities. As for the Kiri-nin destroying the village, well, they won't be alive long enough to see it.

"What about the others?" Otter asked beside me as she drew her shining katana. It was not just her, all of us were pulling out our weapons in preparation for the battle to come. This was what we came here for, after all.

"Elimination." My answer was simple, but it marked the beginning of the attack. Bear and Hound disappeared from view as the rest of us body flickered out of the trees and into the burning village. Zebra set up the earth walls efficiently as Falcon, Otter and I surrounded our shocked opponents. _Good, keep the focus on us, forget about the kid._

The first kill was awfully easy, especially when your opponent was still stunned by masked shinobi appearing out of nowhere. As the shinobi closest to me jabbed a kunai at me, I locked his arm and twisted it in a swift motion until the shoulder popped audibly. As he screamed in the background, I flipped him onto the ground and slashed my sword across his neck.

Nine enemies left, eight chunin level and one jonin level, one hostage in the middle. _This is actually not a too bad situation,_ I thought all of a sudden. Orochimaru was not within our capabilities, but this definitely was.

The next shinobi came at me with a well-aimed fire jutsu. It was all with good intentions, but a fireball, really? _Playing with fire around an Uchiha is probably not a good idea for anyone._ Without any hand seals, I blew out a _proper_ Uchiha Great Fireball. The fireball was more than two meters in diameter and it swallowed up the Kiri-nin's pathetic little fireball as the shinobi barely moved out of the way, only for the flame to engulf his right arm.

However, the Kiri-nin that Falcon was fighting didn't have the great luck his companion had. Before that Kiri-min could even scream, Falcon had already kicked him in front of the Great Fireball and let the bright orange flame swallow him whole.

As soon as I heard the whistling sound of some kind of projectiles, I moved backwards just in time for the water bullets to whizz past my chest. I turned towards the source of the water jutsu just in time to see one of our original targets holding the little girl as a shield as he continuously shot out water jutsu at us. At the corner of my eyes, I saw Bear's shadowed figure. He was ready, I just needed to create an opening.

Quickly, that unfortunate shinobi whose right arm was burned off became my shield as I grabbed him and charged forward. _Oh dear, he is heavy,_ I thought sourly even though it was my idea in the first place. As soon as I had placed the Kiri-nin in front of me as a human shield, three shots of water hurricane drilled into the Kiri-nin's body. _So much for camaraderie._

As soon as the impact from the water jutsu was gone, I dropped the cold body to the side. I wasn't trying to get to the jonin in order to kill him, I had two comrades for that. I just needed to locate his position down to the millimetres.

The moment the view in front of me opened up, I locked eyes with the Kirigakure jonin. I could swear that the redness in my eyes pulsed as the jonin got caught in the genjutsu. His eyes glazed over, his hands that had been furiously making seals stopped abruptly, and his arm around the girl's neck loosened.

The next sequence of actions happened in a blur. Wooden columns rose from the shadows like slithering snakes. One of them gently wrapped around the child and carried her away from all the burning buildings. The others, however, restrained the Kiri-nin down like chains. _Ah, he's dead. There is no way his head will stay as it is, not with Kakashi hanging around._

Sure enough, within a fraction of a second, I saw the tip of a blade sticking out from our target's neck. It only lasted for one second as the blade flashed because of the bright flames, then it was gone, leaving the jonin's head half hanging as its body stayed limp within the wooden columns.

I turned my attention towards my other teammates. Otter had managed to slay one Kiri-nin as she parried the other one for battle; Zebra was holding his own and winning against his opponent while Falcon was having a bit trouble parrying two at the same time. Without another word, I flickered towards Falcon as he elbowed one enemy backwards and locked swords with the other's kunai.

My first course of action was to slash the Achilles' tendon of the Kiri-nin that had been elbowed by Falcon. Unfortunately, this one seemed to have some foresight as he stepped out of the way immediately to avoid being immobilised. Without faltering, I slashed the ninjatō upwards towards his neck, but he blocked it quickly with a kunai.

Usually, dropping my sword in battle would be a horrible idea in which Akira-shishou would hunt me down for forever. However, as I surveyed the battlefield, I realised that with Bear and Hound freed up to help in the fray, the battle was close to completion. That also meant that the village was burning really badly, ready to engulf all of us inside. I didn't have time to wriggle my sword away from his kunai, not when I was using both hands just to hold one sword in place. So yes, I dropped the blade and let the force carry the Kiri-nin forward uncontrollably since there was nothing holding out against him anymore.

The moment my sword fell aimlessly towards the ground, I ducked beneath his outstretched hand to avoid being impaled by his kunai. Then, I jabbed my elbow into his stomach where his kidney was located. As he gurgled and choked in pain, I raised my hands to wrap around his neck and pulled.

A strike to the kidney could only be described as being really, really painful, the kind of pain that could cause you to blank out for a moment, but those precious seconds would be vital in battle. That blank moment was all I needed as his body slumped forward and fell ungracefully. The twisting motion came out sharp and swift, accompanied by a light crack and a disjointed head. _It's been awhile since I've actually used my hand for the kill, but it still comes like a second nature._

As soon as I pushed the limp body off of my shoulder, I picked up the sword embedded in the ground and re-adjusted my grip. When I turned around at the burning village that had become our battlefield, I saw every one of my teammates standing above motionless bodies, waiting for the next order.

I looked around the village, the fire was still burning strong as the villagers diligently hid behind the earth walls Zebra made. Mei's 'clean up' troop didn't seem like they would come anytime soon, but I supposed that the point of clean-up was that there would be no trace leading to us, them, or the relationship between the two groups, so they were unlikely to show up until after we have left the vicinity for a good few kilometers. At this rate, the village would really burn down along with the forest and the villagers definitely couldn't run as fast as us. _See, this is the problem of playing with fire, one should only do it when they are alone in a desolated area - one preferably without so many trees._

"Anyone with a water jutsu should use it now. Don't need to fully distinguish the fire, just bring it down to a manageable level." I yelled into the clearing quite unwillingly. Not something I had planned to do in a foreign land, considering my impression towards the Water Country was not good enough for me to save a village from the flames. However, the civilians are always innocent in a fight between shinobi.

Immediately after I gave out the order, everyone, save for Zebra and Otter, who didn't have a suitable water jutsu, started the seal making process. I made the three hand seals needed for a C-rank water release and blew out a wave of water towards the area closest to where the villagers were hiding.

It was ridiculous how long it took us to bring the fire down to a manageable level, considering the fact that it just wouldn't stop spreading. When the burning heat was reduced to shimmering glows, the six of us immediately left the village. If those villagers were smart enough, which I hope they were, they would forget about what had happened (aka, somebody died) and go hide in the forest where the misty environment would keep the fire from spreading. Now, if only our Kiri contact would come and clean up this mess like they had promised.

The target campsite was just forty minutes from the village where we had gotten side-tracked. If Mei's limited information was correct, then we still had fifteen shinobi to deal with, including the remaining four Kiri-jonin that we needed to kill. Of course, we could always just flood the place, although that might be a risky course of action. However, I suspect if I said 'let's just charge in', he would have put a big cross beside my name regardless of the state of his book.

"Falcon, Otter, got an accurate measure of individuals?" I whispered to the sensors as they concentrated on the campsite in front of us. The base was formatted just like a small military platoon, with tents situated in the middle along with a warehouse and a metal fence surrounding all of them. No doubt, they would have already seen the smoke and flames from our earlier battle, but they would probably only see it as the doing of their Kiri-nin. That also meant we had a little less than an hour to attack before they were alerted by the fact that no Kiri-nin had returned.

"Mhm, they are suppressing their chakra level and the mist is blending all the signals together, but looking at the size of the camp and the density of the area as a whole, I'd say that fifteen is an underestimation. There are definitely more than that." Falcon answered me after a moment of quietness. When I looked at Otter, she nodded in agreement. _Yet, I was so hopeful that our Kiri informant wouldn't screw up, but whether she did it on purpose or not is still debatable._ My eyes ran over the compacted tents, scrutinising every little detail. It was exactly in this situation that the Sharingan proved to be the most effective.

"The smoke … Look at the streams of smoke from the cooking pots, there are at least five of them. They wouldn't waste unnecessary food resources in these times and five pots could feed at least twenty people, perhaps even two dozen." I whispered lightly and watched as a thin veil of dread covered my teammates.

A few more people wouldn't kill us if we were careful about our surroundings as we fought. However, if we went into the enemy zone expecting only fifteen, the chance of us exposing our identity would increase quite a bit. Even if we were to finish our job of assassinating those four, I doubt we could silence all of them without being overwhelmed, and that would be when eyewitnesses could come and subtly suggest Konoha as being the one responsible.

But would this benefit Terumi Mei? Certainly, I could see the appeal of having someone else to blame for the attack, after all, if there was one person who couldn't afford to be named as the instigator of this violent event, it was Terumi Mei. Alas, the working relationship between our two parties was a fickle one and what made it even better was the fact that we all had each other's reputation in our grasps. _Or maybe she is hoping that we'd all die here so she can mop up the bodies …_ Just the thought of a day when one was in the Bloody Mist.

"You are pissed, very pissed. Stop being so pissed." The moment the air darkened around me, Falcon pointed it out quickly and I eyed him in a way that asked 'your point?'. Well, I think that my last emotional outburst with Orochimaru probably traumatised the poor man quite a bit.

"So, what are you going to do? Now that the information has been suddenly revised in the middle of the mission." Kakashi asked me in such a curious tone one would think that he was watching a drama play out in front of him.

A revenge plotline in an overly dramatic soap opera, if I were to be exact.

At this point, I was a hundred percent sure that Kakashi chose this mission for my evaluation on purpose. It was safe to say that I had many issues regarding Kirigakure ranging all the way from what happened eight years ago to the recent events. A part of me wanted to burn the campsite down with Amaterasu. It was a very tempting option like a few minutes ago.

But I couldn't. If our earlier encounter with the enemies told me anything, it was the fact that this region was definitely not completely secluded. Let's just say that my black flame was quite special in terms of its appearance. Besides, I was pretty sure that the point was, I _shouldn't_ kill them all.

Kakashi was watching a drama, but who wasn't? If I wanted to pass this evaluation, I had to produce an ending that will satisfy him. This was where the criteria became blurry, because of he, as an observer, had biases towards the ending. Minimising the risk and maximising the productivity was the things he would want for an ending, but he would also expect the ending to fit with my personality - in other words, it had to be plausible.

In terms of minimising the risks, the best option would be to wait until one or more of our targets would leave the stronghold in small groups and then ambush them. However, that was not very productive and our clients were expecting the results to be fast and immediate.

In terms of productivity, I supposed that the standard procedure would be to sneak in for silent assassinations, and that was what I would have done if there were only one dozen people in their camp. However, between four jōnin targets, the rule of secrecy, and the fact that there were two dozen shinobi packed into that tight space where they had the full advantage of, Kakashi would have smacked me on the head because of the risk level.

Also, let's be honest, a part of him already expected me to start a killing spree.

I shifted slightly on the branch so that I could turn my head and get a better look at the village we had just left behind. The fire had long been extinguished, but the thick, black smoke was still hovering the forest like a permanent mark that reminded one of the violence that had transpired. Despite that, nobody in the area had even bothered to question the violence.

Assassination is an art of extremity. You either take the aspect of 'silence' to the extreme and finish the job before anyone even realises that there was a job in the first place, or you can make it extremely bright to a blinding level that throws them in all directions until you can erase your tracks completely.

After a few minutes of contemplation, I finally spoke up, "So, apparently, arson is a social norm here. In that case, why don't we play with fire for a bit?"


	34. Chapter 34 - People and Weapons

A/N: I've been asked to list team Ro members and some other miscellaneous stuff, so I have put them at the end of the chapter, in order to keep the space on the top more organised.

Beta'd by the beautiful Alice J

* * *

Chapter 34 - People and Weapons

"Are you sure you are not just really pissed off at our Kiri informant?" _Really, that's all you have to say?_ I was sure that Falcon was going to say more until he saw my unimpressed glare.

"How does that have anything to do with the plan? Focus on the two dozen shinobi in the camp, please." I argued as quietly as possible since technically we were still in enemy territory. There was a long pause as my teammates contemplated the plan I had just made five minutes ago.

"Actually, the logic works very well." To my surprise, it was the usually quiet Bear who gave me my first vote of confidence.

"You know that the Kiri force we are working with won't be happy, not after they realise how big of a mess they will have to clean up," Kakashi muttered behind me. He had already scraped off his attitude of watching a drama and fixed his attention at the campsite.

"Then that's their business. They screwed up the information, they deal with it. On the other hand, if you guys were to tell me that you think the plan is impossible, then I'll think of another plan." My last sentence was directed towards all of my teammates. I looked at them one by one, waiting patiently for their responses. I wouldn't force them to go through with a plan they didn't have confidence in.

"I don't have any objections." Suddenly, I heard Kakashi spoke behind me. You know, his voice always contained so much confidence and reassurance when he was serious. I didn't know if he was trying to help me or not, but he being the one to approve of my plan would definitely make my life easier. _He has that true aura of a captain._ Quickly, I received confirming nods from my teammates and I let out a breath without even realising that I had been holding it in the first place.

"Thank you. Bear, Zebra, if you would start the preparations. We begin in fifteen minutes." As soon as I finished speaking, Bear and Zebra disappeared in a stroke of wind. It would probably take them ten minutes to set up, but a bit of extra time would never hurt. As for the signal, well, it would be a hard one to miss. Meanwhile, I needed to set up things on my side.

I bit my thumb and pressed the bleeding digit onto the forest floor while watching the black lines expand into an intricate shape. With a small poof, a petite greyish-brown wolf appeared on the summoning array. All of my teammates save for Kakashi backed up a step in surprise despite the fact that I did warn them beforehand.

"Miss, you've summoned me?" The young wolf asked as he flexed his limbs.

"Yes, Hyousetsu. I would like for some help." I answered. Hyousetsu was one of the wolf cubs that Fuyuki was currently training. His greyish-brown pelt blended in with the muddy environment around us quite nicely, his small size could easily get mistaken for a wild wolf cub, and most importantly, as Fuyuki's apprentice, his earth manipulation only required minimal chakra.

"Fuyuki-san said that she wants to see you," He suddenly said with a polite tone as Otter handed me rolls of soft metallic wires.

"Oh? What does she want?" I asked curiously as I unwinded the wires.

"She said that you haven't called on her for a long time." The cub answered, matter-of-factly. _Of course, that sounds exactly like her._ To be fair, I brought her out four days ago for the training session, but then again, I was supposed to call on her today, that was if the mission hadn't come up.

"Uh-huh, is she having a temper tantrum?" Hyousetsu nodded initially, then after a second of thought, he shook his head.

"Sure, is she mad at me?" This time, he nodded firmly.

"Fine, I'll call on her in a few minutes," I told the wolf cub as he took the end of the ninja wire with his jaws. "Go," I whispered to the cub and patted him gently forwards. With minimal noise, he dived into the ground and swam away, leaving the spool of wires rolling at a constant rate.

"Are we all clear on the plan?" I asked the remaining three teammates by my side who looked like they were having fun watching a family drama. _Ah, perhaps this_ is _turning into a soap opera._ Nonetheless, they nodded reassuringly as Kakashi and Falcon flickered away to the other side of the small clearing near the camp.

Reluctantly, I pressed my hand down on the ground until another summoning array appeared. With a large puff, a wolf as white as snow tried to pounce on me. However, I immediately raised a hand and kept her head at an arm's length.

"Business first, chatting later," I told her determinedly. Right now, I did not want to hear about her complaints towards my tardiness or who gave birth to whom back in her snowy kingdom; that could come later. Over the months, the more I had learned about her, the more I realised that she was actually a very gossipy wolf in nature.

"Well then, let's hear your request," she said with a smirk, seemingly quite interested in the foreign environment we were in.

"Of course, I wouldn't have called you out if there wasn't a big fight coming up. So here is the plan…" I proceeded to explain my 'long' thought-out plan to the wolf. I'd say that the plan was a sound one, albeit a bit violent and destructive, but when had we ever been _not_ violent?

"Somehow, the plan you've made could sound either crazy or logical depending on how you look at it. Makes me wonder what exactly grows in that brain of yours." She looked at me with a curious glint in her eyes, but I just rolled mine in exasperation. When the roll of ninja wire was completely set up, I grabbed hold of the end. I felt Hyousetsu returning to his clan's dimension, so I assumed that Kakashi had gotten the other end of the wire as well. Soon, I returned my gaze to the enemy camp, still oblivious towards the subtle changes taking place around them. Now that everything was set, all that was left was to wait for the signal.

Five minutes later, the warehouse went up spectacularly in flames.

 _And that is our cue._ Silently, I counted fifteen seconds. _That should be enough time for them to realise that something is up._ Like I had expected, the camp started to stir as shadows blurred across the entrance.

"The last one's coming up, chunin, he will cross the entrance at exactly … now." Upon hearing Otter's voice, I immediately flickered near the entrance just as said shinobi was walking out of his tent. He was the last one to get out, therefore, he would have to be the unfortunate one.

I flipped over the fence just in time for him to pull out a kunai and face it towards me. With a sharp flick of the sword, I hit his arm away and locked my eyes onto his. The redness overwhelmed him, and a second later, he started to scream out the words I had scripted.

"Ambush! Enemies at the entrance, Kekkei Genkai―" I slashed his throat before he could finish the sentence. _That's all I need, thank you._ Like I said, unfortunate. Quickly, I threw a kunai wrapped in explosion tags towards the ground, flickering away quickly as the smoke blinded the entrance.

"Are they coming?" I asked Otter as she returned the metallic ninja wire to me. The hidden mist jutsu that was blocking Falcon and Otter's sensory techniques was centred mainly at the middle of the camp but not so much on the peripheral. Therefore, I needed to draw the enemies out all the while never exposing our true identities. See, burning the warehouse down was an extremely old tactic, but nevertheless, it was effective. However, the point of us burning their warehouse down was not for a siege battle but rather to make the enemy feel like there was an actual ambush. In order to guarantee that the four leading figures we needed to assassinate would come out, I added a second attack and made sure that the threat was perceived to be caused by Kekkei Genkai users - a prominent threat that would definitely get the Jōnins off of their asses.

"Yes, I can sense them. Four large signals at the entrance, they are being followed by some chunins." Shinobi were wired a certain way, they liked to deal with things with their own hands, especially when it concerns the prey of the Kekkei Genkai hunt.

Now that the first stage was working properly, it was time to move on. The moment the Kiri-nins - the four targets along with a few more passersby - stepped out of the entrance into our view, I pulled the ninja wire at my end, exposing a spider web of metallic cords. Suddenly, the hesitation left me as I charged my palms with lightning chakra - concentrated and wild - and sent it down the threads. The moment my end of the wires lit up with sizzling electricity, the lightning coming from the other side of the clearing flashed in tune as well. The streams of electricity touched the ground in the blink of an eye and spread out in a jagged web, electrocuting and paralysing anything that was unfortunately in its path.

The second stage was separation: separating our actual targets with those that we don't need to kill. I had never planned to kill everyone here in the first place because it would take too long. The Kiri jonins took priority on this mission.

Before the paralysing sizzles and the blinding flashes in the air disappeared, wooden vines shot out from behind, grabbing all the shinobi who weren't our targets and dragged them back to the campsite. As the wooden columns dumped the shinobi into the camp and slammed the gates shut, I blew a stream of flame towards the gate.

It was a beautiful scene. The fire spread from the entrance and all the way along the camp fence. Like a well-choreographed routine accompanied by the musical sound of explosions, the flames danced and engulfed the entire campsite in an instant, wrapping all of the shinobi inside the immense heat.

It was perhaps the only good thing about having a mission in a land that constantly witnessed acts of violence. Nobody would question too much when there were a few explosions and a burning campsite.

I asked Bear to line wooden columns with explosive tags attached to them around the camp discreetly so that they would rest just beside the metal fence. Normally, the camp wouldn't catch on fire so easily, especially with the amount of moisture in the air, but with Bear's wood release, anything could happen. Once the fire started to lick the trees nearby, it wasn't so easily stopped. The Kiri-nins inside wouldn't die so easily, I _think_. The fire was only maintained through the wood so it acted like more of a barrier than anything else. Besides, most of them had water ninjutsu to help them stay alive, but it would take them a few minutes to get out since the attack was sudden and half of them were paralysed by the lightning jutsu. With Zebra and Bear supplying some wood release, fire release, and wind release every so often, I'd say, we had five, maybe seven minutes?

Now, here came stage three. I locked my eyes on the four slightly shocked and dazed Kiri-nin left outside of the wall of fire. However, they quickly composed themselves and observed their surroundings cautiously. _All that's left is to kill them and let Terumi Mei handle the rest and this is probably the most straightforward part,_ I thought. This was where my plan turned to pure improvisation. I don't make any plans for the fighting, not with this team. We were familiar enough with each other to detect when to add in that finishing slash or blow during the battle.

Fuyuki was the first one to appear out of the shadows as she slammed into one Kiri-nin and brought her jaw down over his head. Apparently, it was impolite of me to not let the wolves be the battle opener, or so they had demanded. That Kiri-nin was a jonin after all, therefore he was able to quickly shake off his daze and block Fuyuki's sharp teeth from biting his head off.

Fuyuki suddenly turned and swiped her hind leg near the ground. The Kiri-nin tripped ungracefully but he still managed to roll away as Fuyuki's abnormally large claw crashed onto the ground where his head would have been had he not escaped. I did give Fuyuki the permission to blow off some steam, but it didn't mean that the rest of us would just sit back and watch.

Fuyuki was cooperative in that she chose to hit a position that the Kiri-nin would have to roll away from the rest of the group, closer to where I was, waiting to ambush. I took the chance and flickered down with two blades in my hands. My first strike was aimed at his heart, the fourth intercostal space between the ribs, to be exact. As the Kiri-nin tried to push himself up from the ground with one hand, his other hand came up and stopped the tip of my ninjatō. Sadly, I still had one more blade. The tantō was smaller, quicker and harder to detect. The Kiri-nin only had the time to widen his eyes as I slashed the tantō across his neck, splattering a trail of blood on the forest floor.

The whole sequence from Fuyuki's starting attack to the first kill had only taken five seconds. _Five seconds and we had very little time left._ I had to admit, the success of my assassination had a lot to do with luck and surprise. The Kiri-nin had obviously been surprised when a _giant wolf_ attacked him, and it was his lack of information that ultimately led to his death.

Now that the grand finale was revealed, the three Kiri-nin who were still alive quickly stood in a triangle formation for better defence as they glared at us with caution and rage. The factor of surprise wouldn't work anymore and we still needed to finish this whole mess before Bear and Zebra ran out of chakra to keep the remaining Kiri-nin inside. For those of us who made a living by licking the blade tips, this was the real deal.

And so, the battle began.

The next five minutes were a mess. Between the heat, the fire, and the weapons, the whole battlefield was filled with confusion. When a shuriken whizzed past you, all assistance and sabotage were fair game.

The last Kiri-nin screamed like a cat with its tail cut as I drew a slash on his thigh and almost sliced it in half. It was supposed to be aimed towards his abdomen, but he had been fast enough to jump up and dodge it, although he probably didn't quite imagine that the silver glow on my blades could cut that deep.

Relentlessly, he twirled in mid-air and swiped his other leg at my face. That tenacious kick forced me to raise my weapons to block and the impact forced me to slide back a few metres. Soon, I blew out three balls of phoenix sage fire as the Kiri-nin tried to rebalance with one leg left useless. He flicked two of them aside and let them join the already waning fire around the campsite, but the third one zig-zagged past him, only to fall back and slam into his back, forcing his newly regained balance to falter.

As Hound and Otter closed in on the Kiri-nin with their glistening swords outstretched, he still had the spirit to pull up two earth walls around him to slow their attacks. However, it only managed to halt the attack for a second before both of their blades broke through the walls and penetrated his mid-abdominal region, holding him in place.

He wasn't giving up because humans seem to have the most tenacity when they were on the brink of death. Suddenly, I was very glad that we didn't just rashly march in. His hands moved furiously in front of him to make a seal for something. _Oh no, you don't._ We were already dragging this out longer than what I was comfortable with, there was no way I would let him run wild with that jutsu that was obviously his last desperate attempt. Without thinking, I threw the tantō at him since it was the closest projectile I could find. The blade lodged itself in the Kiri-nin's neck as blood sprayed all over the earth walls. The silver glow flickered for a second before finally disappearing. It seemed like I still couldn't keep the yin-chakra activated without touching the weapon itself.

"So…" Falcon asked in a small voice far behind me. He sounded like he was panting rather harshly because of the water prison technique he had accidently got caught up in. The water prison was simply a huge pain in the ass.

"So, we get our teammates and get the hell out of here." I continued his sentence while pulling out my precious tantō from the dead body.

"I'll find you later, little rabbit." Fuyuki stepped towards me, dragging a dead Kiri-nin in the process. The dead body wasn't mutilated like what normal wild animals would do; there were sharp puncture holes on his chest, showing that in the end, it had been one fatal strike from the wolf's claws that had killed him.

I didn't even have time to respond to her bossy statement (excuse me, I control the summoning technique, okay?) because she had already put the dead body down and returned to her clan's icy dimension. When I turned my gaze back to the camp, it was still burning, albeit the flames were dimmer and more tamed. The shinobis inside were definitely trying to keep the fire down, hopefully still unaware of what had happened outside.

"You seriously weren't kidding about pissing off the Kiri informants, weren't you?" Zebra said tiredly as he and Bear walked out of the forest. "They are going to be so mad when they realise that we've framed this on the rebel group."

"I think I made more wood columns today than I did in a whole year." Even Bear decided to chime in with a rare complaint. I narrowed my eyes at him, sending him a glare. Trust me, seeing how Kakashi liked to exploit Bear's wood release, I doubt it was that many.

"Well, nobody said the plan was going to be easy. Let's go, we wouldn't want to stand in the way of the clean-up team, would we? I'm sure they are just dying to start on it." My last sentence was followed by a few snickers. Ironically, the simplest job for the clean-up troop would be dealing with dead bodies since it was the easiest to bury. However, with the fire that was starting to burn the forest beside the camp and the fact that I had left most of the Kiri-nin alive inside the camp would make their job of covering the tracks a lot harder. People saw the messy event; they just didn't know what the event really was. But still, I even gave Terumi Mei a chance to be the saviour. I didn't care what kind of tales she would decide to feed the remaining Kiri-nin to get them on her side. Based on my perception of that woman, she would probably succeed spectacularly in convincing them.

Without looking at the bright orange flames that were dancing passionately in this dreary forest or the four dead bodies sprawled out on the forest floor, we left the crime scene silently.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"A word, please." Terumi Mei barely squeezed the words out. I could tell she was trying to be as polite as possible, considering the fact that Konoha did complete what she had asked for. However, her tone was just barely hinting at her hidden frustration. She whipped her body around swiftly, as if every look at me made her even angrier, then she walked away from her escorts to the other corner of the clearing. I didn't need her signal to tell me that she expected me to follow her.

Before I followed along with her, I glanced in Kakashi's direction for a brief second. Like I suspected, even if his facial expression was blocked by the hound mask, I could instinctively tell that he was a making a face that was a mix between "I told you so" and "but I'm too used to this to care".

"You made my job really painful back there, Konoha-nin. I had to save half of the forest from burning, as well as rescue more than a dozen men choked on smoke who still think that there's a rebel group nearby." The moment we were isolated from the rest of our teams, Mei spat the words out angrily with a hint of laughter. Yeah, no, I didn't feel any pity. She was the one who gave me the inaccurate information.

"Unforeseen circumstances arose. Here, as per the agreement." I handed her the folder with all the files on this mission and with a suspicious glare at me, she took it. After flipping a few pages, she burned the documents with ease. The condition for this mission included that the documents detailing our exchanges be destroyed. I didn't know if Konoha made a copy or not, but I did know that the one I gave her was the original copy. If the information leaked out, it wouldn't do either Konoha or Terumi Mei's Kiri faction any good.

"You don't like to lose a single cent, do you? There's no such thing as a fair trade, you can't expect to get payback for everything people conned out of you." Suddenly, she said out of nowhere. "The world doesn't work like that. One day, your persistent attitude just might get you to lose more than you can afford."

"You are an ambitious woman, a trait which I have no intention of gaining." I couldn't help but add. It was totally a spur of the moment, which I shouldn't be doing. However, I just felt the need to point it out.

"This world never lacks ambitious men, but it always lacks ambitious women. Ambition in women is frowned upon because it's rare and unorthodox, but it's nothing to be ashamed of." The woman commented offhandedly with a smile. A very ambiguous and calculating smile that fitted her personality quite well.

"Send your Hokage-sama my regards. Next time, I will go visit Sandaime-dono as a Kage of the same status. When that time comes, Kirigakure will be a safe place for all Kekkei Genkai. That invitation extends to you too, Uchiha, if you ever find that you are in more trouble than you can pay." It was a bad idea to pick up the conversation in the first place, I knew it. There was no way that I would leave Konoha for Kirigakure. No way.

"I will be sure to send the Hokage your kind words." I just outright ignored the last part of her words. Some lines should never be crossed or even mentioned. Seeing Kirigakure's current condition, she still had a lot to do in order to become the Mizukage and unify her village.

"Don't be angry. You may say that now, but as a word of advice from someone who has been there, the higher you climb, the more you need to watch out for your fall. Trust me, keep an eye out for allies and enemies alike, you never know which one will catch you." That was the last piece of advice she gave me before walking off with her companions. I scrunched my eyebrows a bit at her confusing words, but eventually, I left with my teammates as well. It wasn't long before we boarded a ship and left the Country which none of us missed.

"So now the mission is done, how's my evaluation?" I asked as I leaned against the ship railing. The sky was in a shade of dark grey now, unlike when we had come. The dark clouds covered the sky, a supposed premonition of harsh rain. However, the greyness had been covering the sky for a while, yet there wasn't even a single drizzle.

"Mm…" Like always, he didn't give me a straight answer. Instead, as a general habit of his avoidance, he pulled out that carefully preserved novel and started reading from a page in the middle of the book.

 _Sometimes, I really want to take that book and rip it to pieces, just to see how it goes._

"What did she say to you right before we were leaving?" All of a sudden, he asked and I frowned a bit at the question.

"She told me that I should be careful about demanding paybacks. I don't quite understand what she meant," I answered, choosing my words carefully at this exchange.

"She's probably telling you to leave a fall-back zone; a cushion, for both you and your enemy."

"She wants me to be merciful? To the Kiri-nins, in this society where it's to kill or be killed?" I stared at Kakashi in confusion, unable to comprehend what Terumi Mei was trying to teach me. "And do you agree with her? That I should have been more merciful on this mission?"

"No, I don't agree with her," he responded with no emotion colouring his voice at all, "I think you killed just enough to guarantee our safety and anonymity, so I don't have a problem with that. But we are looking at this issue from a shinobi's perspective, while our ambitious Kiri informant was speaking from a politician's point of view." Now, he was catching my attention. My gaze was probably making him very uncomfortable which was why he gave me a long sigh before he continued his previous point reluctantly.

"You and me, we are wired to kill our enemies with no hesitation and that's good for survival, very good. When it's shinobi fighting, it's a fight between weapons and there's no room for mercy. But the politicians, those are fights between people and things start to get ugly when one side has no cushion and starts to go all out. When that happens, it becomes a mere dog fight and in more ways than one, it's way uglier than a bloodbath."

"Do you know why Terumi Mei chose to make a deal with Konoha just to get rid of the extremists quietly when she could have just taken a stand at the pro-Kekkei Genkai faction and rallied up the people? The genocidal faction is very unpopular in Kiri right now, she could have easily gathered more than the majority of the people and forcibly taken the power," he drawled before tilting his head, awaiting my answer with interest.

"She was leaving cushions for herself and her enemy," I said tentatively after a few seconds of contemplation. "If she made a stand and only appealed to one side of the population, she would have lost everything if she couldn't win. On the other hand, she's also offering those Kiri-nin who don't see eye to eye with her a cushion as well. Now that she's playing the role of saviour, if she doesn't win, she won't lose much. But if she does win, the shinobi against her will have no choice but to take a fall onto the cushion instead of openly waging a war against her simply because they have no reason to. Some of them might even be grateful for the cushion." With that being said, Kakashi clapped lightly though I wasn't sure if he was mocking me or not.

"I'm sure she's angry for the Kekkei Genkai persecution, being a Kekkei Genkai user herself, but she's not looking at this from a shinobi's view, where the elimination of enemies is the key to survival. She's not fighting weapons, she's fighting people using weapons and the rules are different. She's giving leeway, after learning from her predecessor who gave no leeway to the Kekkei Genkai users." He paused a bit, scrunching his eyebrow for a second in concentration before he continued. "If you want an example, let's just take a look at the struggle for power between the Shodaime Hokage, Senju Hashirama-sama, and Uchiha Madara. That was a fight with no cushions at all, each side was going all out. It brought turmoil to the entire village and luckily, they finished the fight using a shinobi's method instead of a politician's. If they hadn't, then …"

"Then, we would be like the Kirigakure civil war." I finished the sentence for him. I waited for a second before asking, "Bringing up my distant ancestor, are you trying to warn me away from that kind of a fight?"

"Are you planning to go into that kind of a fight?" He answered with a question.

"No." There was no hesitation in my voice.

"Good." That was all he said.

"How in the world do you know this? I remember that you made it perfectly clear that you couldn't care less about this kind of stuff." I looked at my captain curiously.

"In my opinion, the best way to stay away from something is to learn everything about it, so that you can walk away from it at the first sign." _Good advice,_ I thought as he continued, "You're too young; you haven't lived through a Shinobi War. Whenever a war or a catastrophe ends, the dog fight begins. Eventually, you learn to stay away."

"And were you in the dog fight?" I probably shouldn't have asked him that. At this point, I couldn't tell if I was just brave or impertinent. Most likely the latter.

"Funny you have that idea. No, I was never one of the people in the dog fight." At that moment, I suddenly understood why he would want to stay away from politics as far as he could.

He wasn't one of the people in the fight; he was one of the weapons used by those people.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"I'm sorry, what?" I had once thought that surprising news would lose its shock once I've heard it often enough. Apparently, they don't.

The Hokage looked at me with an amused expression, but his face was still filled with benevolence. Behind me, the room remained silent, not a single gasp escaping because of the news. _Those little liars, they were all in on this._

"I can imagine your surprise, and I apologise for keeping you in the dark," the Hokage continued in his special calming voice, "however, I do believe that the abilities and work ethics you've shown over the last few years qualify you for this position."

I really wanted to ask what in the world made my work ethics qualify for the responsibility he was giving me. However, against the death glare that I was receiving from Kakashi which warned me to behave, all I could say was, "I am honoured by your compliments, Hokage-sama."

"So?" The Hokage asked, but he didn't specify what he was asking. Given our previous conversation, I had a feeling that I should know what he was asking, but I was having a temporary blank out for the moment.

"So…" I muttered. I could feel my teammates' urges to facepalm, and there was no one's stronger than Kakashi's.

"Rabbit, there's nothing to be nervous about. According to your captain's evaluation, you did quite well as the leader on your last mission. He described your improvised method as 'innovative'..." I narrowed my eyes at Kakashi's word choice, isn't innovative just another word for 'crazy and unusual'?

"I, for one, am quite impressed with your plans and diplomatic skills…" The Hokage continued as I ruminated over his words. _You mean how I tricked her into giving me unauthorised information and then pissing her off?_

"But then again, the choice is yours. Whether you take the promotion or not, you passed this evaluation with flying colours. If you don't take it, it won't affect your career. I assume you already understand the responsibilities and pressure that the captains have to shoulder. Ultimately, it's your decision whether or not you want to become an Anbu Captain." Finally, the Sandaime finished his sentence.

"Hokage-sama, if I do take the promotion, I will be pulled out of Team Ro, correct?" After a moment of silence, I asked.

"That would be correct. You will be assigned a new team with some new recruits to train as well as some experienced Anbu agents," the Hokage answered precisely, with no sign of wanting to hide anything from me.

The number of agents in Anbu never fluctuated too much. New recruits came every year, but there were constantly people leaving the force. Anbu was a high-risk organisation, not everyone could stay without physical or mental repercussions. Those like Kakashi who stay for over a decade were rare entities indeed. When old agents leave, new ones came in and fill the spots. If there were no available spots, then promoting an existing member to captaincy and splitting up old teams became another option. Normally, it was quite rare for a team to remain completely static for over two years, but Team Ro was one of them.

That was probably because of Kakashi.

He was good at his job, no matter how much he annoyed me on some occasions, I had to give him that. He made judgments that kept us alive. I couldn't remember how many times he had to bail me out of trouble. I supposed that I was already looking up to him as a role model if I were to be completely honest. I found myself constantly asking what would he do if he were in my position.

What would he do on the last mission if he were the leader? What kind of plans would he make? What kind of decisions would he make?

One thing was for sure: He wouldn't have chosen to burn the campsite like I did. No, he was way too secretive for that. In his opinion, my method might have been effective, but it would have the operative too emotionally involved.

 _But, I am not following directly behind him, am I? I am not stepping on his trail one footprint at a time. I am not catching up to his shadow. No, I tried that with Itachi, it never ends well._ It was at that moment that it became perfectly clear that as long as I was letting Kakashi take care of everything, I would never learn and gain from the experiences. _I am my own person, I have my own identity. I have my own methods of doing things._

"Now that I've laid out everything, what's your choice?" The Hokage didn't rush me, he waited patiently as I made up my mind. He didn't have to wait for long. I supposed that I had already made up my mind long before, I just hadn't been confident enough to act on it.

"I will accept the offer, Hokage-sama. I swear to devote my loyalty to the current Hokage of Konohagakure before anything else. I promise to protect Konoha, its citizens, and the Hokage with my life from the shadows." I pledged the Anbu declaration once again as I kneeled down before my village leader, letting the calm voice fill the room. After the last sentence echoed, I added, "I won't disappoint you, Hokage-sama."

"Congratulations, Rabbit. You are now the Captain of Anbu Team Kō." As I bowed again to the declaration, I couldn't help but feel a bit of pride bubbling in my chest. Maybe I'd finally achieved something other than just surviving to see the next day.

"Also, after some discussion with your ex-teammates, it was decided that Falcon and Zebra would be transferred to Team Kō and both teams will be taking over the specialisation training of two or three new recruits. Captains of both teams, please come tomorrow at 0600 to pick up your team member assignments." Both Kakashi and I nodded, despite the fact that I was a bit confused. It seemed that Falcon, Zebra and I needed to talk about some life choices.

"Rabbit, you may take your future teammates back to Locker room 15 to collect your belongings. Your team is officially assigned Locker room 29 as your base of operation." I nodded at Hokage-sama's words. _I will miss the cold benches in locker 15…_ I almost laughed because of that ridiculous thought. The locker room would probably look the same throughout. It was the people who had changed.

"By the way, if you have any trouble or need any tips, Hound is right there." Before we could leave, Hokage-sama called out to me. I had to work really hard to suppress the laughter as I saw Kakashi's aura darken just a bit. See, our Hokage-sama was really good at exploiting human resources.

Swiftly, we retreated out of the Hokage Office and headed towards the Anbu Operation Centre. The journey was silent, but not in an awkward way. It was more like a mutual understanding that whatever we needed to discuss, we could do it in private.

"Anything the two of you want to tell me?" As soon as the locker room door was closed, I appeared behind Falcon and Zebra. Zebra was okay, keeping his usual calm demeanour, not a hint of being startled. Falcon, however, dropped his kunai because of my sudden appearance. Sometimes, I wondered who was the older one between the two of us.

"No, not really," Zebra answered for Falcon before he could say anything stupid.

"Let me try to make this clear. Why agree to the transfer order? I'm not exactly the most reliable person here, nor am I the most experienced one. I know Hound has his unbearable moments, but I don't think my luck is any better. So why?" I was very thankful for their help, but more so, I was curious. I was just trying to get an answer. One of the things I learned over the years was that when you have the chance to know the truth, don't hesitate.

"Well, we didn't agree to it, we asked for it," Falcon added quietly, and he received a glare from Zebra, who apparently just wanted him to shut up. Now I was really confused so I turned to Zebra for the answer.

"It's exactly because you are so damn unlucky." Under my intense gaze, Zebra started with a sign, "You know, you are not the first patient I lost in my medic-nin career, but you are definitely the first one I saved after you had already died. It was a miracle, I will believe that for the rest of my life. I used too many medical supplies on you for you to die now because of some stupid blood loss."

I blinked a few times as Zebra pulled out his first aid kit from the locker and slammed it onto the bench beside him. It made a really loud noise that startled all of us as the metals crashed into each other.

"Okay...that's reassuring, I suppose," I muttered. No one really wanted to piss Zebra off, but I wouldn't say he was angry or frustrated, more like...determined.

"What about you? What's your excuse?" I pointed at Falcon next, who had managed to drop another kunai because of the loud crash earlier.

"Umm…this team wouldn't be fun anymore without you around to tease." Immediately, Falcon's snarky attitude returned. Seriously, you just couldn't give him any attention. Without looking at him again, I turned around and walked to my own locker.

As I cleaned my own locker, I could hear Falcon's complaints about my dispassionate attitude. However, Zebra whispered (even though we all could hear) to him: "Don't bother, she's not on the same wavelength as you. Her mentality is on a different planet." _Excuse me? What does that even mean?_

"We should go celebrate, for Maiko-chan! Let's go to the Jonin bar, whenever someone gets promoted, it's a tradition for us to go celebrate there!" Suddenly, Otter pulled me into a side hug and said cheerfully.

"Wait, what? No―"

"We should totally go. It's the tradition." Before I could finish the sentence, Falcon added cheekily. In response, I send him a chilling glare. Whenever they wanted to drag me into something, 'it's a tradition' just flowed out of their tongues automatically like water.

"Why not? I assume that you have learned from your last experience or are you still running away from a little cup of sake?" Suddenly, my ex-captain who hadn't made a single comment since we got back spoke up. Maybe it was my imagination but he seemed to be a bit more gloomy today.

"Sure, let's go. It's my _favourite_ Uzuki-senpai's request after all." I squeezed each word through my teeth. I was bad with alcohol, I was aware of that. But Otter had insisted on teaching me how to use chakra to cancel the effect of alcohol by speeding up the detox process. Being such a nice little kouhai, I had taken her lessons to heart.

Before I could even finish packing up, Otter had already dragged me by the shoulder and pulled me out of the door. Suddenly, I had a really bad feeling for this.

 _Okay, maybe I made the decision a little too rashly… is it too late to regret now?_

So before long, I was back at the shinobi bar we visited back when I was thirteen. Since we got back to Konoha pretty late, it was already close to midnight when we arrived at this murky place. I wonder if this was becoming a trend. I seriously hoped not.

The air was still as intoxicating as I remembered. The floating scent of alcohol cramped the tavern, suffocating my five senses, invading my consciousness. So yeah, I made my chakra work overtime to compensate for my lack of immunity towards alcohol, all for the sake of my pitiful pride. But then again, it was because of Kakashi, he always managed to do it somehow.

"Okay, I've got this." I glared hard at the cup of sake in front of me. The colourless liquid was mocking back at me like the true evil incarnate.

"Yes, you've got this," Otter affirmed beside me. I had no idea how the situation had come to this, but every one of my teammates was staring at my attempt to drink my first cup of sake without going unconscious with rare concentration.

"Right, she's totally got this. A hundred ryō saying that she will faint!" Falcon yelled out from the behind as he tapped Zebra's back, trying to get a bet running.

"Don't listen to him, use the chakra to separate the water and alcohol. Once it's in your body, you can control it." Otter reminded me helpfully as I picked up the cup firmly. With one more determined look, I gulped the sake down in one breath, all the while forcing the chakra to filter through the alcohol.

I closed my eyes immediately as the strong flavour entered my mouth. With a hopeful heart, it dimmed and dimmed until I could no longer taste the burning sensation anymore. When I snapped my eyes open again, I was so glad to realise that nothing was swaying or turning upside down in front of me.

"Hey, it worked," I muttered with disbelief. Despite the fact that I was probably like a shining beacon for any sensor in a hundred metre radius, I had won my first battle with alcohol.

"So, what does it taste like?" Falcon asked as he shamelessly poured me another cup. Once again, I stared at the colourless liquid, because I honestly couldn't remember what it tasted like after the sensation of drinking liquid fire was gone.

Reluctantly, but also curiously, I sipped another cup of sake, repeating the same circle of chakra filtering again, trying hard to distinguish what comes after the initial searing burn. It just tasted like … nothing.

"It tastes like water. Pure water," I responded honestly. _Was it supposed to taste like something else?_ Honestly, it had been so long since my last life that I couldn't remember what alcohol had tasted like.

"Oh, whoa, you are filtering the alcohol component out so determinedly that there's no trace left. You must be the first person I've known to order sake, only to drink it as water," Falcon chimed behind me, gaining a few chuckles from the rest of my teammates.

"What is it supposed to taste like then, if not water?" I asked him with confusion. But then again, I should have never expected an honest answer.

"No, no, that's not how it works, you have to figure it out yourself." _And letting go of my control over the chakra? No thank you._ Yeah, just let the flavour of sake be a mystery forever, I could survive with that.

"Oi, was it you who said that my sake tastes like water? I'll let you know that my sake has never been diluted." I blinked at the sudden voice as a tall figure loomed over the counter. Who was he again? Oh right, the owner of the bar, a middle-aged man whose left arm was always in a sling.

"Umm …" I just kept on repeating that one syllable, "That's not what I meant." The intensity of his glare increased. "It tastes really good, worth every penny," I said quickly, chugging down another cup just to prove my point. "The flavour tastes like …" Nothing. Nothing was left after my chakra had run through it.

"Oh, relax, I'm just messing with ya, kid." It was like a magic trick, his tone changed all of the sudden. Before I could figure out this abnormal shift in the atmosphere, he had already smacked me on the back. I supposed that it was a gesture one used on social occasions, but all it did was make the water go down the wrong pipe. I started to cough rather loudly, it was kind of embarrassing.

"Hah, it works every time with new customers. Always so much fun." The bar owner let out a coarse laugh. "Take it easy, kid. Come back more, but don't make it a habit." He walked away after that, leaving me to squint my eyes at his contradicting comments while still letting out occasional coughs.

"As usual, your social awkwardness has no limits." Falcon cut in immediately, not even bothering to hold in his laughter.

"You have … let's say, seven hours to scram before I decide on how to make your life a living hell." I said coldly to Falcon without batting an eyelash. For a second, he actually looked like he was trying to argue, but then he soon deflated when he realised that I kind of did have that power now, effective starting tomorrow morning. Zebra, the smart one, stayed out of the argument as he gave Falcon an expression full of pity.

As time passed, my teammates, save for Kakashi, involved themselves in various social circles in the tavern as the two of us remained at the counter. Silent, gloomy, dispassionate.

"Okay, I know it's your nature to be pessimistic, but you are acting like I did something to piss you off and I can't remember it, so what did I do? At least try to pretend that you are happy for me," I said exasperatedly as I took the cup of sake on the table. I would probably regret this very soon seeing how I was busily circulating my chakra, trying to quicken the metabolising process.

"You are still using chakra for this, aren't you? I'm not dragging an unconscious idiot back this time." Instead of answering my question, Kakashi changed the topic.

"Yes, Captain. I do learn from my mistakes, contrary to popular belief." As if to prove a (very stupid) point, I sipped the sake down. It still didn't have any distinct taste, and it was making me more curious with every cup.

"You don't have to call me 'Captain'. Not anymore."

"Force of habit," I answered as I put the empty cup down. Maybe it was out of boredom or maybe Kakashi's gloom and doom aura was making me uncomfortable, I was suddenly determined to find out what the sake tasted like, So I grabbed the bottle and poured another cup.

"When you get the info on your new team members, remember to go deeper than their profiles to understand each and every one of them. You are not in the familiar environment of Team Ro anymore, you are going to make plans with strangers. Strangers who you have to familiarise yourself with." Suddenly, Kakashi started speaking in a perfectly calm voice. I looked at him with curiosity but before I could respond anything, he continued.

"You also won't have the benefit of everyone's trust at the beginning. You have to establish yourself as an authority figure, a reliable and trustworthy one. It's not going to be easy but you have to stand through this." It was like he had been holding back all those commentaries for days and now, he just couldn't stop the downpour. Nevertheless, I listened attentively.

"Your missions will be a lot more different than the last one in Kiri you supposedly led. It will be harder and there will be more pressure and more responsibilities involved. You can't do things by your whims anymore because you are supposed to be the backbone of your team." _Whoa, that must be the most comprehensive instruction he gave me in forever. For once, he actually sounds like he is willing to teach me._ I swear I was listening, his experiences were very valuable after all. However, at that moment, my bottle ran out, and so far, I was still tasting nothing but water.

So, when it seemed like he was finished, at least for a little while, I reached out for the cup of sake in front of him that he had yet to touch. Hey, if he was not going to drink it, I might as well take it for the experiment.

The moment my fingers wrapped onto the porcelain cup, something gripped firmly onto the cup as well, preventing it from moving. I struggled against the iron strength to no avail so the next best thing I could do was to give Kakashi an angry and accusatory glare.

"I'm serious." No, he was not amused. He stared back at me so gravely and solemnly that one would have thought that one of us was walking towards our death. I was startled for a second by his seriousness.

"Be careful of Shimura Danzō." That was his message. A really important message.

"I know you are, and I am too," I answered, finally giving up on the cup. I didn't know what he really meant and he didn't look like he wanted to elaborate. However, with Danzō's personality, I could more or less gather the gist of it. Shimura Danzō was a spider that weaves its web from the dark, and there was no telling how far that web had already penetrated. However, in order to do that, he needed spider threads he could control.

"Why didn't he show up sooner?" That was a vague question, but I knew he would understand. If Danzō wanted to 'infect' me, then the best time would have been when I was still struggling to adjust in Anbu.

"Because I was there." He said shamelessly as he took that cup of sake away from me. Confident, unwavering, authoritative. That was the Kakashi I respected and followed.

There was a period of silence as I processed his lessons. His gloomy aura was much better now, maybe all he needed was a cup of sake.

"What's with the sudden change in attitude? Finally decided to approach the teaching career properly? Should have done that a few years ago." I teased, simply because I had nothing better to do.

"Probably. Although it would have been much easier if my pupil were less troublesome and demanding." I rolled my eyes as his commented jokingly.

"Oh, trust me, I am probably the best student that you will ever get who will put up with your crappy attitude _and_ your commitment issue. Wait till you get Sasuke, then you will remember how easy it was with me."

"Who said your tiresome brother would be my student? There will be more than one qualified Sharingan user in this village by the time he graduates."

"You know, I'm already teaching him full time when I'm off duty. Therefore, I prefer not having to teach him as well when I'm on duty. But then again, you probably prefer not to teach any Uchiha on duty or off duty." Upon hearing my comment, he nodded grumpily.

"You know what, let's make a bet on who Sasuke's future instructor will be since it's apparently going to be our impartial and fair Hokage-sama's decision. I bet it will be you, and you can bet on the opposite." After much thinking, I proposed. And by 'much', I meant ten seconds of evaluating a pop-up idea, probably under the influence of alcohol.

"What's the wager?" Kakashi seemed mildly interested. It was a pretty fair bet, no one, perhaps except for the Hokage, knew who will be Sasuke's instructor. Although the hint of sharingan was quite obvious, there was still no guarantee. As long as it was someone else, Kakashi would win.

"I don't know … how about one month of locker room work, and that included damage check and weapon counts." Maintaining the tidiness of locker room was apparently an Anbu Captain's job, so was reporting the number of weapons lost in a fight and the number of weapons left in the locker storage. Lots of miscellaneous jobs that I didn't even know existed.

"Make it one week and we have a deal."

"Feeling less confident now, are we?" He glared at me for that one, so I raised my hands in defeat. "Fine, a week, you've got it."

Following the finalisation of our bet, silence ensued again. It wasn't awkward or boring or gloomy, no, it was peaceful and comfortable. Against the noisy background and the drowsy alcoholic scent of the tavern, I found it amazing that I could feel so calm and collected.

"Thank you." _For everything._ That was what I wanted to say, but with the noisy background muffling everything, it became more like a dim whisper.

"Good luck." In return, I heard a faint whisper as well.

* * *

1\. Team members: As of now, Team Ro has been split into two teams. Back in Kakashi (Hound)'s team, there's Tenzō/Yamato (Bear) and Yūgao (Otter). Maiko (Rabbit)'s newly formed team includes Falcon and Zebra, both real names unknown.

2\. Timeline: Right now, it's around two years before Canon. It's August, so Maiko's fifteen at the moment.

3\. Yin-chakra blade: it's a variation of chakra coating techniques, like using lightning or wind natured chakra. However, think of the swords as a container that seals the yin-chakra because of the metal's special affinity for it.

4\. Maiko's stats: I've given Maiko numbered stats just like the Naruto Data booklets have done. So if you have any question with what each of them means, please refers to online Wikia. The stats correspond to right now, so when she's fifteen.

Ninjutsu: 5

Taijutsu: 4

Genjutsu: 3.5

Intelligence: 4.5

Strength: 2.5

Speed: 4

Stamina: 3

Hand seal: 4

Total: 30.5/40

Many shinobi don't use full strength in fights unless absolutely necessary. In Maiko's opinion, preservation for chakra, eyesights, and anonymity are very important, therefore, her MO: what swords can solve doesn't need ninjutsu; what simple ninjutsu can solve doesn't need flashy A-rank ninjutsu; what can be solved by the previous three categories doesn't need Mangekyou Sharingan. I'll probably update the stats when the Canon starts.

Hope those clear off some confusions. This arc has two parts: Captaincy and Danzo, and yes, the first one needs to proceed the other.


	35. Chapter 35 - Autumn Rain, Summer Blaze

A/N: Beta'd by Alice J

* * *

Chapter 35 - Autumn Rain, Summer Blaze

The clock was resting at half past seven when my teammates pushed open the door. One would think that they would be less lively in the morning when they spent most of the previous night drinking but no, all those rules about melatonin and internal clocks just don't apply to Anbu agents because Falcon entered with a screaming hello.

Meanwhile, I was trying to save time by spreading all of the pages on the ground, so that my Sharingan could take in all the information at once. My current life generally consists of four parts: Anbu, training, Sasuke & co. (that included Shun, Naruto and all the people I need to socialise with) and… never mind, just three parts. Now that I would be busier with all the captain's responsibility, any exploitation of Kekkei Genkai was welcomed at this point.

"Careful with your steps. If I see even one footprint on the papers, you're dead." I warned them as they steered clear of the 'landmine'.

"Choose your locker, guys. Since you two are early, you get the first pick." I nodded towards the row of empty lockers as I picked up the files laying on the floor in an order that only I remembered. Technically, I have been here since six but their call time was eight. Even if their intentions weren't very pure, seeing that Falcon and Zebra were examining every single locker like there were extensive traps in them (getting a good locker was very important), I did appreciate the little proactiveness.

"How are our new teammates looking? Anything interesting?" Falcon asked as he finally decided on a locker.

"One new recruit, one transfer. There's one specialised in sensing among other stuff, so you get to have a buddy," I responded. My new team was rather small compared to Team Ro and it wasn't heavily loaded with combat based agents. It made sense since I still required much more experience and a smaller team of five would be a good point to start at.

"Oh? Which one is it, the recruit or the transfer?"

"The transfer. Been in Anbu for three months, reassigned after his old team was disassembled." I only picked the important points to tell him because frankly, I didn't even know much about them. The files only contained relevant information such as their specialisation, previous training records, and skill specs to protect the confidentiality of the agents, not that it always works. I supposed that this was what Kakashi meant when he said to look beyond the simplistic and monochrome profiles.

"Really, is he any good?" Falcon asked again, and I had a feeling that he was up to no good again with that mischievous glint in his eyes.

"According to his track record, very," I said as I flipped through the chart. "He has already been a Chunin for a few years before being drafted into Anbu and apparently, his other specialty is taijutsu." The report was very thorough in terms of combat related information, so that meant I just needed to test for one more thing before completing a full analysis of my new teammate's abilities: Team cooperation.

"Also, we need to sort out the projectile weapons." I pointed at the three boxes of kunai and shurikens that I had found in the storage room. Since these were all recycled weapons, they were tangled with ninja wires and each other. I have to report the exact number of weapons we received in the beginning of a yearly cycle in order to get reimbursed for replacements.

You know, Kakashi never talked about all these small but annoying labours before. A captain deals with all things ranging from locking the locker room to sending in damage reports for any accidentally burned down buildings on missions - the kind of housekeeping things that OLYMPUS never bothered to teach us.

We only had enough time to go through one box completely before the door was opened. Immediately, I turned my eyes onto the two people standing by the door dressed in Anbu standard gear. Two masks - an owl and a raven - entered my field of vision.

A simple hello would have done, but instead, the moment one of them laid eyes on me, he let out a groan of anguish. _Well, thanks, what did I do to get such a sound of agony._ It took me a second to realise that it was my eyes. I had opened the Sharingan earlier for the sake of convenience in sorting weapons and I had never thought of turning it off. Even with the mask on, one could still see the unusual red colour through the eye holes.

"Is there a problem?" I asked the owl-masked man, halting the movement of my hands. However, when he stepped past the shadow, I realised what the problem was.

He had monochromatic white eyes that signified his status as a member of the Hyūga Clan. But really, it was the man's reaction that had truly intrigued me. Usually, a member of a Noble Clan like the Hyūga would learn social etiquettes from a very young age so that no matter what they think, they would appear to be courteous and polite on the outside. In fact, from the uncomfortable silence that I was getting, I could feel his struggle between feeling regretful of letting out that undignified sound and coming up with an excuse for it.

"What's wrong, cat got your tongue?" I prompted again, wondering if he was just really shocked by the Sharingan or if it was because of something else.

"No." Perhaps there was just a hint of unfriendliness in that denial. "I apologise for my rude reaction." And then, the unfriendliness was replaced by a feigned politeness. I got the feeling that he couldn't make up his mind about how to treat me yet.

"It's just that I've heard quite a bit about you. Some say that you are difficult, others deem you to be inexperienced, and the remaining ones claim that you are dangerous." It seemed that he was yet again changing his attitude. They were all sound observations from many different perspectives, I supposed.

"What about you, what do you think?" I asked with curiosity. He was definitely different from the Hyūgas I had worked with over the years, which wasn't that many, granted. However, there was an air of agitation around him, like he was desperate to start a conflict.

"I don't trust you," he answered harshly, "The Uchiha before you murdered his own Anbu team in cold blood when he ran out of the village." _Okay, now that's a territory we don't go into._

"Leave your preconceived notions at the door. I'm not bringing up your past history, so don't bring up mine," I said coldly. Hokage-sama must have felt especially courageous the day he decided to assign a Hyūga and an Uchiha onto the same team. I must have struck a nerve because I saw a flicker of pain and anger in his otherwise blank eyes. It was then I realised why he was having so much trouble controlling the polite manners today.

Perhaps, he was just angry.

Owl was the new transfer from the disassembled Anbu team, a young member of age sixteen. No matter how much euphemism one used, 'disassembled' usually meant more or less one thing: the team had taken such a huge damage that there weren't enough people left to continue. Whether that meant the members had died or retired, those details were considered to be confidential and thus were excluded from his profile. Also, he was being transferred at a critical time and was probably still adjusting to the Anbu lifestyle. I get it, he was angry and agitated, unfamiliar with a new situation, and suddenly finding out that he had to work under an Uchiha on top of everything just sort of made it all explode.

So in light of all the possible reasons, he attacked me.

Well, not exactly 'attacked', per se. For the sake of my new team's peace, I was willing to write it off as a friendly poke aiming for a very important tenketsu spot. Still, it didn't make it less annoying when I had to quickly grab a kunai and use the flat side to block the exact spot where the tenketsu that would have cut off my chakra was.

The Hyūga were not easy targets to fight with. Personally, I believe that the best method to fight them is to not let them touch you at all since one click at the wrong spot meant that your body would be dead for a whole five minutes. Sharingan reveals their attacking patterns to be as clear as day but Byakugan would see through most Sharingan genjutsu, so I guess that we were even.

"See, we are not that different," I said calmly as his hand was halted by the kunai in my left hand while the handle of another kunai in my right was pressed forcefully against his neck. "You like to aim for the tenketsu and I like to aim for the jugular vein."

"I apologise, I acted rashly." I could actually hear a hint of genuine apology in his voice when he retracted his hand. "I just wanted to see your Sharingan in action." Soon after, I did the same. This Hyūga was weird, so weird that I couldn't figure out his problem or motive at the moment. It was like he was in a constant mood swing with rationality fighting against agitation.

"Don't worry, we can do that later. We'll be working together, so you'll get plenty of chances," I finally said after a moment of silence. Yep, Hokage-sama was either very brave or very drunk when he made the decision. Or perhaps, he was taking the phrase 'what a coincidence!' way too far.

"Now, sit down," I ordered and he obeyed without any resistance. I pointed at the remaining two boxes of weapons and ordered again, "Start sorting the weapons." I needed the numbers in by today, so any free labour was fair game on the table. With no complaints, Owl started to pull out piles of weapons and diligently worked on separating them.

"What about you? You going to come in quietly or do you have a show to put on as well?" I turned my attention towards the other guest. Raven, the new fourteen-year-old recruit, had only recently completed his general physical conditioning.

Raven nodded quickly, not showing a speck of emotion. For some reason, he seemed awfully familiar. I couldn't say why, but my intuition just screamed at me that I knew him from somewhere. He stepped into the locker room and closed the door behind him before he also sat down to sort the weapons, much to my appreciation.

"Since our introductions were cut short, let's start again," I said as we were just finishing up the third box. When I got their full attention, I continued, "Welcome to Team Kō, I am Rabbit, your current Captain. I am new to my position, so please tolerate me."

"This is Zebra, our combat medic-nin. If you want your battle wounds to be treated without pain, I suggest that you don't piss him off." I waved towards Zebra who nodded in acknowledgement.

"Falcon is our sensor, so he will be working with Owl to corroborate information." I pointed at Falcon, who gave them a smile to lighten the mood.

"Raven, since your specialisation is mainly assassination, I will be mentoring you." The boy was calm and collected in accepting the news, but still, I couldn't shake off that feeling of familiarity.

"Team Kō is assembled as a combat-oriented task force, so please make sure that you have something - taijutsu, ninjutsu, bukijutsu - to stay alive. However, I hope that you know the improvements in your skills are largely based on your own practice and dedication." I wasn't too worried about their combat skills. The Hyūga was definitely an overachiever with his taijutsu and as for Raven, I would have to monitor his training anyway.

"As for the topic of trust," I eyed Owl, whose Byakugan was as white as ever, "Since we are on the same team, some basic level trust between comrades is needed to guarantee survival. However, any further doubts that you need to clear, try to judge them for yourself over time, not from the gossips outside."

There were a few nods followed by a calm silence where none of us spoke. The clattering of weapons continued until all the kunai, shuriken, and knives were sorted neatly into small piles.

"Let's go to training ground 61," I proposed suddenly, then turned to Owl, "I can see it in your eyes that you want to beat the crap out of me." At first, he looked bewildered at my straight forward words, but soon, he nodded as well. In the meantime, I could see my old teammates' eyes light up in curiosity. A fight between a Hyūga and an Uchiha, I would pay to watch, except that I would rather be the observer than being the one in it.

However, I kind of wanted to try the Hyūga Gentle Fist taijutsu right now, despite knowing that it was referred to as the bane of an Uchiha's existence.

Maybe I was just feeling masochistic and studious.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

The moment we made the seal of confrontation, I started to regret my decision while feeling amazed at the same time.

The Hyūga Gentle Fist could definitely be called the epitome of taijutsu. It undoubtedly covered all aspects of a good close combat style. Speed, precision, and power. My ancestors might roll in their graves if they ever heard me saying this, but without the Mangekyou Sharingan, most Uchiha would have a very hard time against a Hyūga of similar age and amount of years of training. In terms of hand to hand taijutsu with no weapon, I would lose spectacularly.

That became apparent when he first charged towards me. My Sharingan was able to pick up his aim just barely before the attack actually arrived. Immediately, I raised the sheathed tantō and blocked the fist that was aiming for my shoulder.

 _Speed, very fast; impact, medium strength; effect if connected with my shoulder, definitely something unpleasant._ I only had the time to organise that information before his other fist arrived near my heart. Quickly, I took a step to the side and let his hand sail past my turned body, all the while whipping out the other sheathed sword and struck towards his stomach.

The force from the strike forced him to take a step back, but he calmly sliced his hand towards my neck like a kunai while his other hand was still forcefully exerting his paralysing chakra against my tantō so that if I dared to retract my sword, it would go right through to my arm. Without any other choices, I body flickered away before my neck would be hit.

It wasn't a surprise when his attacks followed the moment I landed somewhere else, his Byakugan was known for its extensive field of vision, after all. Immediately, I made the hand seals to bring up a circle of earth walls for defence. The stone was quickly penetrated by the Gentle Fist but it still gave me enough time to drop the sheaths of my swords in order to expose the metal blades.

When he broke through the stones, his fist was quickly met by a metallic blade surging with paralysing electricity. The electricity hungrily ran past his hand towards his arm, but with a quick rotation of his feet, he was able to break free of the contact all the while using the spinning momentum to thrust another fist towards a rare point on my arm - about thirty-four millimetres above my elbow.

Quickly, I flicked my sword and drew a wide arc towards his exposed neck. It was a gamble to see if he would withdraw his attack for defence. It turned out, he would. His strike slowed down for a second as he forced his body back, giving me just enough time to use the other blade to force his hand away.

The surge of electricity on his arm disappeared quickly once the contact with my lightning chakra coated sword was lost. Using the Sharingan's rudimentary skill in seeing chakra, I could tell that he was excreting chakra precisely from the tenketsu in his arms to negate the paralysing lightning. That made sense, considering that he was probably able to release chakra at any tenketsu in his body and inject them into my tenketsu, therefore causing paralysis, internal bleeding, and a whole lot more of unpleasant stuff I would prefer to avoid.

We broke apart for a second time as my opponent re-established his fighting stance, except for this time, I charged first. At the moment, my swords were the only things that could protect me against his fists. With the lightning that coated the blade, he would need to constantly exert his chakra to cut through mine, which meant that it would take longer for his chakra to seep past the metal and into my body.

Immediately, the sound of metal against fists was heard throughout the training ground. He was very diligent in aiming for all kinds of crucial points on my chest, neck, head, arm … virtually everywhere that had a tenketsu. Fighting with him felt like fighting with a puddle of water, always so fluid and natural with changing the positions and directions of his strikes. But with the Sharingan, I could discern his attacking pattern very easily. I suddenly felt very glad that I had invested more time into speed-oriented taijutsu and kenjutsu more than anyone else in my clan.

After five minutes, he was starting to feel the drain on physical stamina. I could see his movements starting to slow down a bit as he blocked a strike aiming for his stomach. Anbu agents tend to have better physical stamina since we were trained to move faster, fight more and take on assignments at the moment's notice. Since I was in Anbu a lot longer, I had a lot of time to get my stamina up while his training had only just started.

Experimentally, I looked up and locked eyes with him. As the red stared into the white, I cast a genjutsu. Even if his visual was still unhindered by the ability to see chakra, the sense of touch and pain might still shock him, and it did. The moment I thrust my sword towards his shoulder at the exact same spot he had tried to seal my own chakra with at the very beginning of the battle, his Byakugan pulsed violently, signifying that he had broken free of my genjutsu.

Nevertheless, the sword nicked a cut and send a torrent of lightning chakra down into the wound. If there really was a tenketsu spot there, the lightning would have paralysed his chakra circuit and therefore would have been harder to dispel. I couldn't release any pure chakra in an instant like the Hyūga, but I could inject lightning-natured chakra into one's body through wounds and it was way more lethal than just the paralysis on the skin.

He was surprised by the sudden paralysis, but it didn't faze him. Immediately, he rotated smoothly and performed a roundhouse kick. Instinctively, I brought up my arms to block it and completely forgot to use the metal to prevent a tenketsu being hit.

His foot hit my armguard with a strong force and soon, I could feel his destructive chakra seeping past my skin and instantly stopping the chakra flow in my left arm. Begrudgingly, I blew out a Great Fireball, which was so familiar to me that I didn't need any hand seals, to force him to let go.

The fireball separated us effectively as I flipped backwards to adjust my balance. As my paralysed arm dropped the tantō and slumped with soreness, I saw my fireball being blown apart by a mass amount of chakra released from Owl's body.

 _Ah, now I see why the Uchiha hated the Hyūga; they are our weakness by nature._ However, there was a small detail that intrigued me. When he first broke out of my genjutsu, he turned his head towards the back for an instant before returning his attacks to me.

Just to test the theory again, I flickered towards him again. Even though one of his arms was slower than the other because of the earlier attack, his taijutsu attacks were still as vicious and precise as ever. As I dodged his fists, I stabbed one of the swords into the ground and released a web of lightning.

Smoothly, he reorganised his steps and rotated his body carefully to flee the lines of electricity, but I had already predicted his path since I had really left only one opening in the web of icy blue. Quickly, I locked my eyes with his once more and used the strongest genjutsu I could muster with a normal Sharingan. In reality, the difficulty of a genjutsu depended on how badly we could mess up a person's chakra; the more coils we could infect, the more sensory and emotional perceptions we could control. While the Hyūgas were experts at recognising chakra coils and could control chakra flows, it didn't mean that genjutsu doesn't require time to break.

Very bravely, I pushed the hilt of my sword forward as his movement halted for less than a fraction of a second. _There it is, he turned his head back instinctively to look for danger …_ My sword hilt smashed into his mask mercilessly just as he had finally returned to the world of reality. The sword made a large crack on his mask as he fumbled backwards, but he regained his balance quickly and thrust a palm towards my lower sternum.

After the last time he destroyed my left arm, I made it my life's mission to never get touched by him again. So straightaway, I flickered away, silently thanking Shisui for really hammering down on my body flicker.

I could feel his presence looming over me the moment I had regained my footing, so immediately, I blew out another two-metre fireball to halt his movement. Perhaps, it was the stamina's issue because this time, instead of negating the attack using a well-timed release of chakra, he flickered backwards and dodged it, letting the fireball smash into the forest nearby and therefore, effectively starting a mini fire.

 _Okay, one arm down, that limits things, but I'm just going to have to make do._

Once I located his position again, I immediately made the one-handed seals for a fire release. A dozen little balls of concentrated flames shaped like dragon heads flew off into the distance and surrounded the Hyūga. In terms of range, this attack was very similar to Phoenix Sage fire, but the added step of shape manipulation would result in a more refined fire release and therefore, harder to negate using chakra.

I force the dragon heads to attack him at different angles and I had to say, I was fascinated by the fact that he was able to block most of them with the precise strike of a hand. I could see the tiny needle-like projections made out of chakra that sliced the fireball apart. Using this method, he was able to get rid of six of them while dodging the other six.

Before he could move, I remotely controlled the remaining six dragon heads to attack him again and shot off a series of basic wind blades from my right palm. Under Owl's watchful eyes that were full of suspicion, the wind blades collided with the fireballs and the dragon heads instantly doubled in size.

I was careful in controlling a few wind blades to stay out of the fray. While the Hyūga rotated fiercely to negate all the bouncing flames, I caught the one moment where his rotating steps had halted to get rid of one especially large fireball and sent the wind blades flying to him from the behind

The genjutsu earlier blinded him for a mere moment, but that was enough for him to panic afterwards and immediately check the one spot that he couldn't see for sure. It was an instinctive action, and I doubt that he even realised it, but old habits die hard. I could deduce that the general direction was behind his neck, however, it was the concentrated wind blades that helped me determine where exactly that spot was.

The aggressive dragon heads took more chakra to dispel than some D-rank wind blades, forcing him to keep most of his stances facing towards the front. So, for most of them, he managed to dodge or just ignore them as they sailed past his body. However, there was one that had flown towards the back of his neck at around forty-five degrees above the horizon, yet he didn't react to it until it was literally an inch from his neck. It forced him to turn around and actually cut through the wind blade.

 _Really, that's the only spot his eyes can't see? In that case, he seriously doesn't need to move his head that much to check for danger._ That was a bad habit, turning his head for almost forty degrees just to get that one-degree coverage. The worst part was that he had a tendency to turn his head both from the left and right during the two instances of genjutsu. That was how I had figured out that the blind spot was directly behind him; if his weak spot was only on one side, his habit would be more consolidated to only turn from that one side.

At that moment, I decided that I would hate and admire the Byakugan with a passion. So at the same moment as he was striking the wind blade, I readjusted my grip on the ninjatō and flickered as fast as I could. The moment I had arrived behind him, the tip of the blade was already touching the base of his neck.

It didn't matter if he had seen the rest of my body, what mattered was the fact that he couldn't see the weapon, and therefore, he only turned to strike my body instead of blocking the sword. His palm collided with my ribcage a second later, but other than the painful impact, he didn't inject his chakra because the cold metal had already made a thin red line on his neck from the back to the front. If I had pressed any harder, it would have pierced him.

"I hate your taijutsu, it's like the bane of my existence," I said bitterly as we made the seal of reconciliation, seeing that I still couldn't feel anything from my left arm.

"Yet you still won and you found my blind spot," the Hyūga shot back with a hint of anger.

"You have a bad habit of turning your head to check for it, you know that?" I raised an eyebrow at him while he just frowned. After a few seconds of contemplation, he shook his head.

"Why would you tell me?" He asked with confusion, and I just threw him a glare that said 'are you dumb?'

"One of these days, I would really like to work with a Hyūga who isn't hostile to me. Your taijutsu almost killed me, so I would prefer to be on the same side as you." I pointed at my left arm expectedly and Owl hit the tenketsu point again with quite some reluctance. Immediately, I started to shake my arm furiously to get the paralysis off.

"Let Zebra see to the cuts and burns," I said to the boy, and immediately, I could feel the heated accusatory glares. "What? I'm desperate. I had to come up with something for the Gentle Fist," I defended quickly.

"Your ninjutsu is too annoying, but I thought that I would never meet an Uchiha with a decent taijutsu." After that, he just walked away from the field and retreated into the forest. I wasn't even sure that it was a compliment seeing that he had just degraded my whole clan. However, it was true that against his Gentle Fist, all I could do was evade. Speed and kenjutsu solved half of my taijutsu problems while stamina solved the rest. Give him time to pull up his fitness and I might not be able to evade his attacks for this long.

That being said, the next time I fight a Hyūga, I would definitely go for a different attack route. Curiosity killed the cat; because of my curiosity towards his Gentle Fist, I had stubbornly engaged him in a taijutsu battle and therefore one of my arms was still sore. If there was any satisfaction in this ordeal, it was the fact that I still had a lot to learn. Speed was a problem, so was the fluidity of my strikes. I should probably work on the non-sensory aspects of my genjutsu as well. Also, I was trying to remember all the tenketsu spots where he had tried to hit me. I might not be able to use the Gentle Fist, but the idea of precise strikes was the same with my own taijutsu style. A hit on a small tenketsu could block the chakra pathway, but there were some rather large tenketsu that could cause extreme pain.

"Would you like to have a go, Raven?" I asked the other boy standing at the edge of the field. The fight had been difficult, but since we were not actually killing each other, I didn't use that much chakra. The boy nodded quietly and pointed at his sword, and I immediately understood that he wanted to have a kenjutsu battle.

I picked up the fallen tantō on the ground and signalled him towards the centre of the field. However, the moment he had raised his sword in an attacking stance, I knew who he was.

 _Yep, it's him. I don't know if this was pure chance or Hokage-sama's way of showing humour, but it just took 'ironic coincidence' to a whole new level._

It was quite obvious from the moment he took out his sword, and the next ten minutes when I parried with him just confirmed my guess. The way he raised his sword up to his chest level for an offence position, the ability to fluidly use his sword with both hands, and the fast precise strikes so similar to mine. That was the Shinbara Kenjutsu style, combining Iaijutsu with the essence of Nitōryu. The last time I checked, Akira Shinbara, the current holder of the Shinbara Kenjutsu style, had only taught it to three students in the past five years. There was only one boy among the three.

With the last strike, I flicked his sword aside and it hit the ground a few metres away. I looked at his raven mask sourly, unsure of how to accept the fact that out of all the Anbu teams he could have been assigned, Hokage-sama sent Ryuu to mine. I could see the reasoning aspect of all this, just a bit. He had only been learning with Shishou for two years before he was drafted into Anbu. It was plausible to think that I would be the best person to instruct his kenjutsu, given that I had actually 'graduated' from Akira-shishou's charge.

"All of you are dismissed for now!" I yelled to the two teenagers immediately and the Hyūga left without a second reminder. Then, I turned my attention to the other boy, "Raven, be back here in two hours, we need to start your training as soon as possible." _Of course, after I finish an important chat with our Shishou._

When the two new recruits left the training field, I walked back to Falcon and Zebra who were extinguishing the flames from the fireball earlier and sat down in the shade. In Konoha, the weather was quite hot during the summer, but as soon as it hit August, the weather cooled down so much that it could be called an early autumn.

"Owl's taijutsu is really powerful. He will be a strong addition to the team if you two could just get the family feud sorted out," Falcon teased beside me.

"There's no family feud, you need a clan to start that. At least, I don't have a family feud, don't know about him." The Hyūga and the Uchiha rarely saw eye-to-eye when we were still both Noble Clans. In the end, most of those competitions came down to pride.

"Shame. What about the other one, he's in your expertise, what do you say?"

"Good potential; needs more practice." _And probably some attitude adjustment based on my previous experiences with him,_ I added in my head.

"I think you two can relax for today. I'll finish tallying up the weapons later so you two don't have to worry about it," I said to my teammates and both of them nodded expectantly, "A mission assignment should be given in about a few days, so stay alert."

Pretty soon, both of them had left. I stayed under the shade for a while longer, enjoying the chilling breeze that fought off the summer heat.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

There were only two places Shishou could be if he was not on a mission: the Jounin lounge or his home. Looking at the time of the day, the chances of him being in the lounge was probably higher. Now that he didn't have any students to deal with, he was quite relaxed.

Quickly, I packed up all the weapon boxes and pushed them into spare lockers. Before I left, I took off the grey vest and threw on a jacket, not even bothering to change the rest. Trust me, after a few years in this line of business, time becomes a more important matter and appearance less so every day. Which was probably why Shishou wasn't startled (although weird looks were given) when I burst in through the doors just as he was about to pour a cup of coffee.

"Coffee?" After half a second of awkward silence, Akira-shishou accepted my insanity and asked casually.

"Sure, thank you." What else was I supposed to answer? Nonchalantly, Shishou grabbed another mug and placed it next to his.

"What brings my long-time-no-see pupil here?" He asked as he poured the hot brown liquid into both cups.

"We need to have a talk, a very important talk, preferably somewhere private," I answered.

"A very important secretive talk? Is this about that thing that starts with an 'A' which we both are very familiar with?" Akira-shishou raised an eyebrow as he handed me the cup of coffee.

"Yes, Shishou, this is about that thing that starts with an 'A'." I accepted the cup of warm coffee as Shishou scrunched his eyebrows. I could almost see the wheels in his brain turning, contemplating whether or not it was a good idea to indulge me with my sudden and potentially rule-breaking conversation.

"Fine, now is as good of a time as ever, since there's no one here. What do you want to talk about?" He asked after a few seconds of thinking and I wasted no time in stating my question.

"Did you recommend Ryuu to Anbu?"

"Boy, you really like to cut to the chase, don't you? Why, did Momo say something about it?" Akira-shishou laughed dryly, then he sat down on the couch as if he suddenly realised that this talk would be long.

"I am always very straightforward with you, Shishou. However, if it were just something Momo said while she was worried, I wouldn't have bothered you with it." _Seriously, what did he expect me to talk about? I thought we had reached a consensus that this is about Anbu._

"Hokage-sama recruited him, he is an excellent kid, not as inhuman as you are, but still, you must know that his unusual kekkei genkai is highly valued. If not for Momo, then why are you here?"

"Ah, I came here because I just discovered who my new teammate is. Guess what, it's that kid." I waited for a second for any kind of reaction, but he just sat there and stared. Then, out of nowhere and several beats late, he choked on his coffee and coughed violently.

"Wait, you got a new teammate? How?" I narrowed my eyes at my shishou with disbelief, _really, that was the only point you caught in the whole sentence?_ After taking another breath, I clarified what I said.

"Long story short, our team got split because we need room for new recruits. The real point here is that _your_ favourite student, _my_ not-so-favourite kouhai, is on my team, flaunting that incomplete kenjutsu training he learned from you."

"Okay? I fail to see the point here, I would think that it's a good thing that Ryuu gets to be under your wing. Got to show your responsibility as the senpai somehow, given how little you've shown over the past few years," Akira-shishou said it so nonchalantly that I really kind of wanted to throw some coffee at him just to see if he would wake up.

"Shishou! I'm serious!" I yelled exasperatedly. I was really trying to make a serious conversation here, and no, I refused to let this become another conversation about my supposed laziness.

"I know, I know, you and he have some unresolved issues and the two of you don't get along. But you are always wearing the mask, aren't you? If you don't want to tell him who you are, then he wouldn't be able to recognise you."

"We will be working together, it's not like the Sharingan is very common around here," I said with dead seriousness.

"Okay, let's just hypothetically say that there are some minor issues with confidentiality, I still can't see what the problem is?" Upon hearing his words, I fell silent, wondering if I could actually talk about the _major_ issue.

"Um… you see, I might have, just might have, seen him somewhere back in the days, while I was on an Anbu assignment, killing someone. And I am pretty sure he saw my face as well," I articulated the words slowly and as the sentence progressed, my voice became quieter. I should have taken the precaution back then, probably erasing his memory of me when I showed him the genjutsu. But then again, if he didn't have the reassurance of someone showing him the escape route, he might have thought he was crazy and go mad.

"... Back in the days as in when?"

"Okay, you know that two years ago, there was a political struggle between two factions in Kusagakure? However, before the conflict was resolved, one faction's leader disappeared without a body ever being found, presumably assassinated. After that, the faction dissolved itself, the government were stabilised, and Konoha's relationship with Grass was as good as new again." Seeing that this was going to be a long conversation, I sat down on the couch as well, across from Shishou.

"Wait, don't tell me you did that," I nodded, "... you performed the assassination, didn't you." I nodded again as Akira-shishou facepalmed. For what? It was not like I had a reason to say no.

"And Ryuu? Don't tell me you met him there, I know he was from Grass, but for him to bump into you on your mission, that's just ridiculous." _Oh, shishou, you won't believe how much ridiculous shit I have seen over the years._

"The Grass political leader who died, he was using rescued war orphans as a front for human trafficking, and that's how I infiltrated his place. So while I was at it, I found the kidnapped children. Ryuu … I don't know what happened, but he was one of them. I was hoping, Shishou, that you would provide me with some information as to how he enrolled in the Academy." Shishou stayed silent while I waited. Back when I had first met him, his unusual appearance as an Academy graduate stirred up my paranoia. But I kept my distance and shut my desire for an interrogation because he didn't diss about my secret in Nishikawa's villa. Now, by whoever's command, it seemed like I couldn't keep that distance anymore.

"Ryuu, his official status just before he passed the Chunin exam was still under 'refugee'. He came two years ago, which matches the timeline of your mission. However, at that time, he wanted to be admitted into the Shinobi Academy instead of the civilian one. I heard that it was rejected initially until they tested his physical fitness and chakra coil and found that it was close to a year three Academy student. Given his Kekkei Genkai, he might come from a shinobi lineage." Shishou gave it a slight pause before continuing.

"They put him in his age group just for the sake of it. I thought he would fail the first test since it would hardly matter as he can just repeat a year, but apparently, his growth was phenomenal, all the way from the most behind kid to one of the best in the year. I don't know what kind of answer you are looking for, but just tell me, are you asking for personal reasons or security reasons?" Shishou's mass amount of info dump came to a halt with the fundamental question: What do I plan to do with the information.

"Personal ones," I said after much thinking. I supposed that there was always this thing on my mind when I saw Ryuu under any circumstances, like a haunted past I wanted to bury and that was why I had planned to avoid him until the world ends.

"Then you shouldn't be having this talk with me. I told you everything I know, any other personal stuff you want to figure out, I'm not the one to ask." It didn't take much for him to put on that teacher side, did it? I nodded slightly and drank the cup of coffee quickly before deciding to go back to the training ground again.

"By the way, congratulation on the promotion though I would've been happier if you told me yourself." As I squeezed myself out of the door, Shishou said in an awfully cheery attitude.

"Oops, sorry, Shishou, I'll come visit you and Shinsei-kun sometimes." I waved back with an apologetic smile.

"Wouldn't count on it. But please take care of Ryuu and correct that incomplete kenjutsu of his." Despite the words he said, anyone could hear that gleeful tone in his voice, probably due to the mention of his precious son. Shinsei was only seven right now and he had only just started his training in kenjutsu. After a quick nod for the promise, I left for the training ground in order to fulfil it somehow.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

 _His kenjutsu isn't too bad,_ that was the first thought that came to my mind when I raced to the training ground. Based on the hacking marks on the tree trunk, I would say that he had been here for at least an hour.

"Your free leg is not in the right position, and it makes your transition steps slower," I commented blandly as I leant against a tree. The boy whipped his head around so fast that it was a wonder that his mask stayed on. Still, I could see that pair of familiar dark eyes through the holes, staring at me, examining my own presence under the rabbit mask.

"Be careful of the leg you are not putting your weight on during a strike or else your follow-up attack will be slowed," I added again. With a slight nod, the boy proceeded to try the attack once again. This time, it was much better as two clean strikes landed on the tree, making another two incision marks.

"Captain, I thought the session starts in thirty minutes?" As I was pulling my own 'teaching materials' out of the sealing scroll, I heard the teenager ask from a distance.

"I'm fulfilling my 'senpai duty' as mentioned by our sensei unless of course, you've got somewhere to be in the next thirty minutes?" I cocked my head to the side a bit and asked innocently. I could see his body tense up for a second and his hand twitch at the straightforwardness. _Aww, he is already flustered, no wonder Kakashi likes to tease me, this is kind of fun._

"No, Maiko-senpai, I don't." The boy answered honestly, already catching on to the direction of this conversation.

"Good, because we've got a lot to cover today," I said to him as I set up the dummy and motioned him closer.

"I don't know why you would choose assassination as your specialty, but it's your choice. So the first thing you need to learn is the human body anatomy." I pointed at the dummy in my hand as the boy provided me with his undivided attention. See, when Kakashi and I went through this, it only took us maybe ten minutes to get on the same page, but for a new learner, it would probably take days, even weeks to memorise and identify these deadly spots in different body types.

"First, let's talk about the head. The brain is the most important part, you destroy someone's brain, they are pretty much as good as dead. So depending on the weapon you use, there are several spots you can pick."

"If you use senbon, then the eye is a good point of entry. With a good hit, you can pretty much penetrate the critical region of the brain." I gestured at the cross mark I made on the eyes of the dummy before turning it around to show the back of its neck. "However, for a more reassuring hit, the brainstem is a great choice. Once the weapon severs the brain stem, it's an instant paralysis of all movement and voice. More importantly, even if the target doesn't die immediately, the dysfunctioning of breathing and heart rate will definitely finish the job."

Watching the young boy listen attentively to my lecture almost gave me a sort of accomplished feeling. _He better be paying attention, I spent a whole thirty minutes just on the colour marking._

"Next, we move onto the neck, another spot with several options, but the target would most likely be well protected. Jugular veins, carotid arteries, both need to be severed in order to kill a target fast. However, if you cut deep enough, the trachea can be cut to ensure that no sound will be made." I made a slicing motion with my fingers across the dummy's neck to demonstrate my point. Ryuu seemed to be following okay, seeing that he was eyeing the critical points I mentioned closely.

"Another common option with the neck is to break it. A good twisting motion damages the spinal cord and maybe even the brain stem, causing instant paralysis and eventual death. The strength of this method lies in that it doesn't spray any blood, therefore one can disguise the assassination and delay the discovery of death."

"So kind of like what you did with that kidnapper guard back then." Suddenly, the previously silent boy spoke up. Even though he tried to keep his voice detached, I could feel the unevenness of his intonation, as if he had waited for so long before he could say something.

"Ryuu, just because I was nice to you for one second doesn't mean you get to push the boundaries. I think I've told you once before, you say one word about that, I will kill you." I eyed him harshly, trying to figure out what it was that he wanted. We had such a good oblivious atmosphere before, keeping the secrets silent; keeping the past buried.

"I never thought that included telling you as well," Ryuu answered, eyes staring back defiantly against my criticising gaze. Ah, he wanted the reassurance for the single most confusing thing in his life, I guess I couldn't really blame him for that.

"Yes, I killed that guard by breaking his neck, and I also remember telling you to get the hell away after that. So, what did you do?" As Ryuu's posture relaxed a bit from my apparent willingness to discuss the topic, I posed my own question. This was a fair trade, he got my story, now I wanted his.

"We ran. Just like you said, all the people near the room had left in a hurry just as everyone else woke up. I took them on the escape route you showed me using the genjutsu - I only learned what that was after I got here - and we got out okay, but then everything went wrong." I watched as Ryuu paused momentarily after spitting out everything in one breath, then continued after taking a deep breath. He must have been holding back on the topic for so long with no one to tell, and I had been the one who kept on denying him that opportunity.

I didn't want to deal with him because he was a reminder of a past decision I had made. A decision in which I didn't want to know the outcome or take the responsibility for.

"We were planning to go seek refuge in a nearby village, but we got attacked on the way. The bandits, they took a third of us and the rest could only run away. The group went separate ways after that. Half of us continued to a Grass village, and I took the other seven to find Konoha." In stark contrast to his previous detached voice, there was a definite hint of pain leaking out.

"The seven children who came with you, how are they?" I asked, shamelessly tearing at the scars. But he looked like he was happy to answer; he was happy to continue with this conversation.

"They were accepted as civilians, I think most of them are adopted now." _So something good did come out of it,_ I thought bitterly.

"Do you hate me for it? Leaving you like that; leaving the children behind and walking away? Do you blame me for it?" I asked again; since we were already on this topic, might as well get it over with. Was it my fault? I didn't think so, not really, I was not the saviour for all who were unfortunate. But I wanted to know, what he had thought of it. After all, no matter how ridiculous the circumstances were, he would be my subordinate - my responsibility.

"No! Of course not!" For a second, he seemed startled as if he had lost something important.

"Relax, no need to be afraid. I just want to know your honest opinion. If there's a problem that could affect the team dynamic, I need to know." I reassured him and toned down the harshness in my voice.

"No, Captain. I don't. Your genjutsu, it gave me a chance to survive, I couldn't ask for more." Ryuu answered again, his voice more composed and more determined.

"If I take your word for it, then it would mean that you don't intend to cause any personal drama in the future, am I correct?" He nodded immediately.

I would take his words with reservation simply because I had some trust issues myself. But at the moment, Owl seemed to have more issues with me than Ryuu. Without further ado, I moved our scattered attention back to the training dummy.

Then, the rain poured down from the sky.

 _Whoa, really,_ I thought in my head as the chilling autumn rain drenched the forest. There must have been a certain comical factor in it, but I was not seeing it.

"And, our session ends now. Here, all the vital spots marked and annotated. Study for it, I'll test you tomorrow." Quickly, I threw the flimsy mannequin at the boy who almost stumbled to catch it. Here's to hoping that the colour markers would stay on and not be smudged in the rain, after all, I spent _so_ much effort on it.

Slowly and full of uncertainty, the boy nodded, tugging the dummy under his arms. _Well, he's not the only one full of uncertainty,_ I thought silently in my mind as I watched the boy run across the forest, protecting the precious dummy from the vicious autumn rain that marked the beginning of a new page in life.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Mmm … they should be leaving right at this instant. So, left or right?" I asked the Hyūga beside me who was staring at the cargo crew intently. Both of us were crouching on top of the tree branch, watching a group of travellers - wait, they were actually Iwagakure shinobi - pack up their food onto horses and prepare for the road.

"I'll take the right. There are more explosive tags on the right. You might blow them up with your fire." I rolled my eyes at the hostile-but-not-really comment.

"And I thought that the Hyūgas don't have a sense of humour. The same goes for you since the explosive tags can be activated by pressure from the impact as well." Over the past ten months, it had become a social norm for us to diss each other using stereotypes about each other's clan. I don't know who started it, but I did know that within one month of our first introduction to each other, it was quite clear that normal insults just wouldn't do.

For a Hyūga or an Uchiha to join Anbu was rare. In fact, I think that Itachi and I were the only cases of Uchiha who were in Anbu ever since the village's founding. Of course, the reasons for both clans were quite different. For the Uchihas, it was a legacy to continue the career in the Konoha Police department. But for the Hyūgas, I wasn't exactly sure, but it might have something to do with how protective they were towards the Byakugan. The mortality rate for Anbu was higher than the normal Shinobi Force, and the chances of recovering any bodies were slimmer still. Amongst other reasons, joining Anbu wasn't forbidden in the Uchiha or the Hyūga Clan, but it wasn't exactly encouraged either.

So, over the course of ten months, our relationship was still as dynamic and complicated as ever, and the competition never really faded. However, at the very least, we both acknowledged the fact that we shouldn't judge each other based on bedtime stories of the evil rival clan.

"Five on the left; five on the right, perfect. It's a complete elimination, leave no lives behind. Falcon and the rest should be finishing up their part as well," I said briefly as Owl gave me a small nod. Despite our competition, he understood quite well that listening to the chain of command was beneficial to our survival.

When the horses started to slowly pull the caravan along the isolated pathway towards the Iwagakure Border, we started our improvised attacks.

When I landed on the left of the caravan, I immediately put the closest Iwa-nin under the genjutsu. While the Iwa spasmed and dropped to the ground, sounds of crashing and screaming could already be heard from the other side of the caravan.

 _I had been hoping to get a few more under genjutsu, but thanks for alerting them._

I wasted no time in stabbing my sword into the neck of that Iwa-nin on the ground. At the same time, numerous earth spikes rose from the ground, threatening to impale me on the spot. Swiftly, I dodged them and before the spikes could completely close in on me, I sent out a Chidori blade that instantly extended and punctured through all the spikes in front of me and pierced through one of the Iwa-nin's heart before he even had the time to react.

I ran forward, flickering past all the crumbling rocks. Arriving in front of one of the Iwa-nin, I sliced my sword across his body. The shinobi was quick to bring out a sword that was hidden somewhere in his civilian outfit. The ninjatō struck against the chokutō and the metallic sound rang for a few seconds. The other two closed in on me in the meantime, one of them threw a few kunai while the other lashed out a few sharp water needles.

Immediately, I brought out the tantō to flick the kunai aside with ease all the while twisting my ninjatō until his own sword hand was in an awkward position. The ninjatō sliced through the tendons in his right shoulder as I kneed him in the stomach. His body slumped because of the pain, and I immediately grabbed his collar and pulled him to my right just as the needles arrived.

Just to make sure, I stabbed the man's brain stem for the kill before flickering away from the danger zone as the shinobi fired another round of water needles. I appeared a few metres down the path and to my annoyance, the water needles made a sharp turn and followed me.

In an instant, a giant fireball gathered in front of me before I shot it off towards the two Iwa-nin. The water needles were definitely evaporated, but the fireball was stopped by a giant mud wall. So instead of seeing charring corpses, I saw the mud and stone get blown off.

Without wasting any time, I charged again. Right in front of the blackened mud wall, a few earth spikes rose from the ground. Seeing the impending danger, I jumped onto the side of the caravan, shaking it a little before flipping off of the side to land in front of an Iwa-nin.

It took two strikes to kill him, one on the leg and one on the neck before I moved onto the next one. This time, my first strike was blocked by a spinning shuriken as he skillfully lodged the tip of the blade into the groove. I tried to use the Sharingan to cast a genjutsu, but he swiped up a handful of dust that forced me to close my eyes, much to my annoyance.

I could feel the kunai in his other hand aiming for my heart, so I blocked it with the tantō immediately. Since my ninjatō was lodged anyway, I just used it as a lever and flipped over his head. My free hand grabbed his face and snapped it backwards as I landed behind him. Forcefully, I pulled his head back to expose the neck for the cut

I dropped the last body while letting out a long-held breath, waiting for my breathing to return to normal. Just as I was turning around, a man rolled over the top of the caravan and free-fell in front of me, probably because he had been flung off by Owl's Gentle Fist. Calmly, I stabbed through his heart, pinning him to the side of the caravan for a second before I pulled the blade out and let his body fall again.

Soon, I jumped on top of the caravan and looked down at the right side. Four bodies were lying on the ground with precise incisions across their necks. No doubt, Owl had beaten them senseless using Gentle Fist first before inflicting the killing blow once they were all on the ground.

"Let's load the cargo now, shall we?" I said to my teammate, before jumping down. We pulled the ropes apart, revealing crates of what should be metal weapons and explosives tags. This mission objective was to catch a band of illegal weapon smugglers to Iwagakure who were exporting shinobi weapons and explosive tags. Only in the middle of reconnaissance had we figured out that the Iwa-nin weren't just dealing with any normal mercenaries or armed dealers, but rather, a high Fire Country official. Therefore, we split off into two teams with Owl and I eliminating the Iwa-nin and securing the smuggled weapons while Falcon, Zebra, and Raven dealt with disposing the middleman's bodyguards and abducting him for further questioning.

Promptly, I pulled out the expensive sealing scroll from my waist and opened it on the floor as Owl did the heavy lifting of taking the crates out of the caravan.

"So, want to have another sparring session after we get back?" I asked him as he placed the crates in front of the scroll in an orderly fashion. He paused for a second before turning to face me, suspicion glinting in his white eyes.

"Can I see all of your Sharingan skills?" He answered with a question. I knew full well that this was a bargain. We competed very often, mostly through sparring sessions because one, he didn't want to accept the fact that I could beat him without using the Mangekyou; two, I found his taijutsu as a painful, but effective way of improving my own close-combat skills.

"No," I answered without hesitation. "Unlike your Byakugan, using the Mangekyou could actually blind me. If you want to gather info on the Sharingan, try something less damaging."

"Don't try to pretend that you are not mapping the tenketsu spots through our sparring sessions. You are never going to be able to use them anyway." There was a certain hint of pride in his voice that made me want to roll my eyes again. _Not the Gentle Fist, but some of the larger tenketsu spots could be easily accessed by senbon. As long as I can succeed in manipulating the lightning Chidori into senbon shapes without them exploding, I could potentially send very damaging chakra down their chakra circuits, destroying them from the inside._ Yes, fighting with Owl was forcing me to come up with all kinds of ways to fit attacks in a one-degree range.

"Sparring sessions are beneficial to both of us. I helped you get rid of that nasty habit of looking back and now you also know that those chakra negating strikes can't negate everything." Yes, I was very happy to remind him that he couldn't negate the Chidori when it was at its most concentrated form, for example, the original form and when I channelled it through my sword. It was all about the chakra concentration since even the most precise surgical blade couldn't cut through concrete in one strike.

"Don't get cocky, I'm far from the best in my clan. But, I'll admit, they are mutually beneficial to some degree, so, sure." He just had to say it with such an unwilling tone, but I still let out a small smile behind the mask. Competitions, they push us to move faster, last longer, and increase accuracy. Most importantly, they let us see the weaknesses that we couldn't see on our own.

While Owl was finishing up with the crates, I surveyed the fallen bodies. I could perhaps fake it as a bandit attack, seeing that all the crates would be missing anyway. However, anyone with eyes could tell that they didn't die from just any hack and slash. In that case, I clapped my hands in a tiger seal and immediately, the bodies and the wooden wagon caught on fire.

When the bodies were more or less charred to the point of no recognition, I made a few more hand seals and clapped the ground. The ground collapsed and then rose up from the side, swallowing the bones and ashes alike. After a few seconds of thundering noise, the road was back to being completely flat like nothing had happened.

"The Iwagakure shinobi exchanged for ten crates of explosive tags and twelve crates of metal weapons, right?" I heard Owl asking out of the blue. I took a moment to make sure before nodding in confirmation.

"One of the crates, the explosive tags weren't filled to the top." Upon hearing that, I walked towards him. My teammate was staring at the unopened crate with distrust, and I couldn't blame him. If some explosives were missing, then we needed to figure out where they went. However, it was possible that one crate wasn't filled up completely in the first place.

Before I could contemplate any longer, a hawk descended from the sky, flapping its wings violently until I extended my arm for it to land. I fished out the small scroll tied to its feet and immediately opened it for the content.

"The rest of the group has secured the target, so they are meeting us on the path," I stated the contents of the scroll briefly, "Come on, we can go interrogate the weapons dealer and see if he can confirm the number of explosive tags the Iwa-nin had gotten." With a small nod, Owl moved aside and allowed me to seal the large crates into the sealing scroll.

We were about to leave, ready to disappear off of the open road and into the forest for rendezvous. That was when we both heard the explosion down the road.

"I think we just found our missing explosive tags," I said, drawing a cold breath. The Iwa-nin and the weapons dealer made the trade in a nearby village. It wasn't very large or populated, but it just happened to be hosting a small summer festival. If my memory served me right, the two-story building that had just been exploded was one of the busier gathering spots for numerous small trading venues. The Iwa-nin must have planned to use the explosion as a distraction to lead the Konoha shinobi at the border post away from their positions.

Without the need for any instructions, the two of us rushed down the country path. The orange fire had started to dance seductively on the half-fallen building as if mocking Fire Country's searing summer blaze for not being hot enough.

* * *

A/N: So the update schedule might get wonky now. I'm trying really hard to update once a week, but I'm graduating this year so the exams are a month away and I really need to study. Again, I will try my hardest to stick to the Saturday update schedule. So, a reviewer asked why can't siblings who have Mangekyou just switch eyes, and I think it's a damn good question. Since they are transplants, they probably don't need the original eyes. Any thoughts?


	36. Chapter 36 - Freedom

A/N: Finally, I got it done in time! Beta'd by Alice J.

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Chapter 36 - Freedom

I frowned at the scene in front of me, in fact, I wasn't even sure that we should be here at all. The two-story building wasn't blown to pieces completely, which was good news. It seemed that the Iwa-nin had only used the cheapest explosive tags for the distraction. The fire was flashy, so was the sound, therefore it only destroyed some supporting structures on the first floor, causing the building to become lopsided.

At the start of the mission, we had screened through most of the merchant groups that crossed the border in this area and observed them for three days, before actually determining the identity of the Iwa-nin. From there, we followed the buyer in order to catch the seller, but the foremost objective of the mission was always the elimination of the foreign shinobi buyer. Our team put a surveillance on the Iwa-nin for hours before the trade and all the way after the trade. It didn't make sense for them to have the time to put these land mines in place. Unless, of course, it was already set up before we even got here. After all, there were two sides to the negotiations and these low-level explosive tags don't necessarily require any chakra; they could be activated by a single spark of fire.

Using Owl's x-ray vision, we had already determined that some had already died on the left side from being crushed by the second floor. However, most people on the second floor and the right side of the first floor were still alive. Injured, but still alive. The biggest problem was the fact that the building was on fire.

We should leave, honestly, we should. The Shinobi from the border patrol would come and take care of this. However, despite the messenger hawk I had sent them, Falcon had confirmed that the friendly chakra signatures of our border patrol were still at least ten miles away, showing that they wouldn't be here for at least twenty minutes. By then, the building would really collapse.

"Take off your masks and put on some generic transformation jutsu. We are not going in as Anbu; we'll just pretend to be the border patrol," I finally commanded. Anbu shouldn't be seen by the civilians, so we would just borrow the border patrol's identity for a while and shoot them a message later.

"All civilians please move away from the scene," I yelled out to the crowd and immediately I got more screams back asking for what the hell had happened. For a second, I was tempted to yell 'shut up'.

"A formal investigation will be conducted later once the immediate threat has been taken care of. Now, if you don't want to get hurt, please get as far away as you physically can, the jutsu don't have eyes, okay?" There were a few grunted responses, but most of them were happy to move away from the threatening fire. Quickly, I turned my eyes back to the burning building.

"Falcon, Zebra, use earth releases to stabilise the structure, so things that want to fall, don't fall," I ordered the two men quickly. The building had to be stabilised first before we could flood the water in. As soon as a few earth walls rose from the ground and provided the structural support for the second floor, I started to make the hand seals for a water release.

"Raven, Owl, water release, right now, the wooden structure won't last very long." As soon as the words left my mouth, a wave of water rolled out of my palm, wetting the muddy ground, the burning wood and the survivors alike. Very soon, a few more small waves joined in as well.

It was painful, trying to get the fire under control, considering the fact that there were no rivers running through nearby. It was so much easier when I was on the burning side instead of the rescuing side. I added a few more earth releases in the meantime to consolidate the structures, and most importantly, prying open that entrance to the first floor.

After five minutes, the fire around the first floor was extinguished, but since fire likes to travel up, it had climbed all the way to the roof. I narrowed my eyes at the building, trying to figure out the best way of approaching it.

"How many are still alive?" I asked Owl.

"Twenty on the second floor, there are only five on the first. The left side of the building is way too damaged for any of them to survive … even the right side, most of them are injured, they can't get out on their own," he responded diligently.

"But most of the second floor people can?" After a second of examination, he nodded.

"Keep up with the water jutsu for a while longer," I said to him briefly before changing the hand seals for an earth release. A moment later, I flickered to the left side of the slanting building and clapped my hand on the ground.

A tall mud wall rose from the ground at a slanted angle and collided with the wall of the second floor, smashing a hole through the wood. As soon as the structure was made, I yelled to Falcon and Zebra, "Tell them to get out through the ramp and carry any injured with them. Add earth releases as you see fit if the ramp is about to die." Then, I turned my attention to the first floor.

"So, here's the plan. Owl will give me the directions, I will use earth release to hold up the building and Raven will get the injured out, one by one. There will be things falling down trying to impale you, so be careful, understand?" I explained swiftly. I would definitely need some help with the Earth Release for this, so straightaway, I bit my thumb and let the black lines expand from the ground.

"Oh, little rabbit, what did you do this time?" Really, that was the first thing that came to her mind when she saw fire?

"Unfortunately, I'm not the one who committed arson." I pointed at the entrance held open by messy stone spikes, "I need some more earth releases." Upon hearing that, she let out an excited smirk. Before I could say any more, I felt an annoyed glare drilling into the back of my head. Shaking my head at my difficult teammate, I marched into the little dark hole, hoping that there were still people salvageable.

The inside was full of smoke, all gathered up in the tight space with protruding wooden splinters. In the murky area, I could hear sounds of sobbing and groaning, telling me that there were some signs of life.

Quickly, we got into the routine like a conveyer belt. Owl would give me the coordinates, telling Fuyuki and me where to place the columns or walls, then, once he was sure that the structure was supported, Raven would go and get the civilian out.

"There's one more left, 36 degrees down your right, 9.73 metres away. Be careful, there's an unexploded tag near that area." Following Owl's voice, I glanced at the direction he mentioned. _A few fallen wooden beams blocking the way, so they have to be moved manually._

"I'll secure the ceiling and the walls, can you go move the beams?" Ryuu just carried out a man, so Owl would have to do the heavy lifting. This time, he followed the order promptly with no questions. Life and death situations were included in the rare instances when he would refrain from arguing with me.

Owl chopped the wooden beams apart with well-placed chakra releases at the weak points. However, once he was done and therefore revealing the women trapped in the corner, something unexpected happened.

She could still walk, actually; she was just trapped behind the fallen beams. Usually, that would be a good news, except for the fact that she tried to move too soon. "Miss, please don't―" I didn't even get to finished the sentence before she accidentally touched the explosive tag while trying to push herself up using the wall.

At that moment, I had a lot of things planned in my head, including a few defensive strategies to get my teammate, and maybe perhaps the women, out of there. However, before I could do anything, Owl reached her first. I could see the torrent of uncontrollable chakra released from all the tenketsu of his body and rotating insanely.

It was evident that unlike his usual, well-controlled chakra releases, this one was wild, uncertain, and disorderly. He didn't have control over the rotation, nor did he have confidence that he could control it.

The dome of chakra was very effective in bouncing off all the fallen rocks and wooden splinters. The bad news was, the high-speed rotation sent all of them towards me and Fuyuki, with no warning at all.

My Sharingan saw the incoming rock first, and then I felt the pain before I could react. Without hesitation, I raised the silver skeleton, covering myself and a shocked Fuyuki alike. When the smoke and dust cleared again, there was a hole on the right side of the building as well.

"Get out!" I screamed at my stunned teammate, waking him out of a trance-like state. He jumped out of the building immediately, carrying the woman with him. A second later, I walked out with Fuyuki beside me, using the silver giant as a cover to keep the fallen beams away. As soon as I was out, I dispelled the silver chakra instantly.

Blood was running down my left arm, but it was the crack earlier that had really scared me. A stray rock had hit my left arm before I could even react, which said something about the speed and unpredictability of that jutsu Owl had used. I was able to expand the silver giant before it could crush my arm completely, but it still left considerable damage to the bone.

There was a low growl beside me before Fuyuki pounced on Owl and bashed him onto the ground. "Fuyuki, no!" I managed to stop her before she could actually bring down her threatening jaws.

"Get off of my teammate," I demanded, and after a few seconds of a staring contest between Fuyuki and Owl, she stepped off and returned to my side.

"What the hell was that explosion? And what happened to your arm?" Falcon asked worriedly as my teammates rushed to us. I glanced beyond them and saw the victims - most injured and covered in dust - standing or lying on the ground. In total, twenty-five of them had escaped in a group of thirty-two.

"Let me see that arm." Obediently, I gave my arm to Zebra. After a basic check, he explained, "You're lucky, it's a non-displaced fracture, I can put it back together and start the healing process. There shouldn't be any long-term effects _if_ you rest it well for the next few days." Despite the stressed syllable, I decided to ignore his patronising tone.

"So, how did this happen?" I heard Falcon ask as the cloud of healing chakra soaked into my left arm. I was about to say 'accidental friendly fire'; it wasn't a big deal, accidents happen. Perhaps, a warning would be nice next time if he ever planned to use that unstable technique again. But before I could, someone interjected the conversation.

"It's my fault. I didn't listen." _Wait, what?_ I looked at Owl in surprise. "She asked me for coordinates of the remaining explosive tags. I was distracted by the last victim, so I went to help the woman instead of answering. Then, it suddenly exploded, rocks fell on us before she could use a technique to shield us."

 _Hang on, let me get this straight. Did he just use an excuse of insubordination and negligence in order to get out of the charge of friendly fire?_ No matter how I evaluated the situation, it wasn't a trade anyone would be willing to make.

"You're kidding, right?" Falcon glared at Owl as he shouted angrily. "You had one job, a job our captain assigned you. I don't care what kind of personal problem you have with her, you were putting your teammate in danger."

"Wait, no―"

"I'm sorry. I apologise deeply for my inappropriate actions." _First of all, did he just cut me off and secondly, did he just apologise to_ me _like he actually meant it?_ I opened my mouth to say something again because the situation was getting out of hand and the truth had gotten twisted somewhere along the way. But then, I saw Owl's eyes.

Ah, he actually looked scared. Horrified even, for reasons I didn't know.

"You know what, we have to leave. The civilians are getting agitated now that the building actually collapsed and I don't want to stay here when they want to blame someone." I decided that however this thing should be resolved, it should be decided later. Falcon wanted to say something else, but I stopped him promptly.

"No, don't argue. We need to get that man you tied to the tree for interrogation and you are going to send a message to the border patrol, telling them to back up our identities," I barked at Falcon, forcing him to move on from the topic, and then, I turned to Owl.

"And once we get back to Konoha, we are going to talk about this … incident. Don't try to run away."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

He ran away.

We got the information from the weapon dealer through some minor interrogation methods, and by that, I meant that I was experimenting with some genjutsu that focused on the sensory neurons. It turned out, the Fire Country official who sanctioned the illegal trades was quite high up on the ladder, and therefore, we would have to keep our mouths shut and let the Hokage deal with the politics. Furthermore, it seemed that the explosive tags on the civilian building was planted way before the deal and was actually ordered by this Fire Country official instead of the Iwa-nin. I supposed that it would be easy to blame this hit on bandits or neighbouring enemies in order to cease control of this village near the border. It would have made controlling a secure smuggling route much easier.

The moment we got back and dropped the man off to the interrogation unit, Owl disappeared from the grid. Because of the strong encouragement from Zebra, I went to the hospital first to get a cast. After that, he had already changed his equipment and left the locker room. I knew that I could probably find him in the Hyūga Compound, but I doubted that the Hyūga clan head would appreciate it.

The electric senbon sizzled at the tip of my finger, threatening to blow up. Perhaps, it was feeling my agitation. Before the senbon made of a mini Chidori could explode in my hand, I flicked it out towards the already-battered dummy on the other side. It wobbled because of the electric discharge in the air and missed the target, only for it to blow up near the seal boundary.

Training facilities in Anbu had a few rooms lined with chakra seals that could negate chakra and record the signature. It was the perfect place for practising unstable ninjutsu without blowing up anything other than ourselves. I turned to glance at the pile of uncompleted reports in the corner of the room, just to make sure that I hadn't burned it yet, before turning my attention back to the ninjutsu problem at hand.

Chidori, by essence, was not that much different from normal lightning chakra. However, what gave it its unique attacking power was its concentrated form. Normal lightning chakra focused on properties like paralysis, burn, and the wide coverage. However, Chidori went to extreme lengths for speed and penetration by concentrating the chakra at one point instead of spreading it out. Kakashi uses his hand as that gathering point, but I preferred to use my sword because after using them for so long, they were like natural extensions of my arms. For me, sending the chakra to my sword was no different from gathering the chakra near the tenketsu at my hand.

Lightning was a wild chakra to use; it had a tendency spread to wherever it can. Therefore, moulding a high concentration of lightning chakra required extensive control to keep it from expanding. Using that logic, all the variants that I had devised for long-ranged attacks and increasing the area of effect - the Extending Chidori Blade, Chidori Electrifying Web, and the Chidori version of Raiton: Rairyū no Mai - required more chakra to control because they still carried some of the traditional lightning release's characteristics. Adding the concentrated Chidori chakra did, in fact, increase its speed and attacking power by quite a bit, but still not as significant of an increase as between using normal lightning to coat the sword and using the sword as a gathering point for close range Chidori.

Shape transformation to senbon was another problem. Chidori senbon was not used as simply as using explosive tags, rather, my idea behind it was to take advantage of the fact that Chidori lightning was way more concentrated than normal lightning. By compressing as much Chidori lightning into one thin senbon, it could penetrate small areas while containing way more chakra than it looked like, allowing it to penetrate a target's body with ease and subtly damaging them from the inside. However, the problem was how much Chidori lightning could be compressed into one senbon. Too much, and it will blow up; too little, it couldn't be called a Chidori version anymore.

Not feeling like giving up, I tried again. A ball of Chidori chirped and crackled in my right hand and carefully, I added some pure chakra for the shape transformation and long-range control. The ball of sizzling lightning separated over and over until a line up of fifty tiny senbon appeared above my hand.

 _And here comes the hard part,_ I thought as I released the icy-blue needles all at once. Between the fifteen metre distance from me to the dummy, twenty exploded, another twenty crashed into each other and exploded. Only ten hit the dummy, and even then, it was blowing small holes on the mannequin's surface instead of piercing them through.

 _Maybe, I should relinquish the chakra for long-range control and use them to keep the shape stable instead. These senbons are going too fast for me to control the trajectory right now anyway._ Experimentally, I gathered as much lightning chakra as I could compress within one ten-centimetre senbon until I could at least hear the whisper of birds chirping and sent it off towards the dummy's forehead.

The penetration was better. It actually pierced into the dummy and then exploded inside of it. On an actual shinobi human, once the senbon enters the body, it could explode and cause quite a bit of internal damage. If it was accurate enough to penetrate a tenketsu spot, since chakra liked to follow the lead of other chakra, it could potentially damage their chakra flow or even blow up their chakra circuit depending on the point of entry.

The aim, however … I wanted to cover my face in shame. I was aiming for the head, but it hit somewhere near the left chest. _Yep, definitely need to work on that chakra control._ The senbon shape had to be completely maintained, meaning no accidental electric discharges or crooked shapes during flight.

A small warning beep sounded above my head, telling me that I had exceeded the maximum chakra load in the barrier for the hour, or maybe it was the smoke detector. Reluctantly, I grabbed the files from the corner of the room - surprisingly, they were still intact, how disappointing, there went my excuse - and signed out of the training facility.

The arm sling was still hanging on my neck awkwardly as I walked down the hall of the Anbu locker room. I still wasn't sure what to write on the mission report now that several versions were bouncing everywhere. Also, Owl obviously didn't want me to write the truth down, but making up another story that dumps all the responsibility on him seemed like an over exaggeration to me.

Of course, I didn't know his reason, but I would if he had bothered to have that conversation with me ten hours ago. So yes, to say that I was irritated was a severe understatement.

It was Anbu protocol that every injury on a mission had to be reported and accounted for. Friendly fires are considered accidents, so as long as the situation was explained, no one would get in trouble. However, if the injury was caused by insubordination and negligence, it was a different story. Depending on the severity, the punishment varied from suspension to forced removal. If Owl was going to continue with that story, I would have to give him a punishment, even if it was just a light one, to show that the protocol was being followed.

 _Ah, maybe I do need to go to the Hyūga Compound and just shout for him. Eventually, he'll get embarrassed and come out, or I might get bombarded with the Gentle Fist first._

While I was passing my own locker room, the door was suddenly opened. A hand grabbed my wrist and pulled me in. I was quite certain of the identity of my attacker, but it didn't stop me from kicking him in the knee. As a low grunt of pain sounded in the background, I shook off his hand and closed the door behind me.

"Attacking a person who just had her arm broken, not a smart choice." I dropped the incomplete report on the bench and glared at the Hyūga in front of me. _Ah, why does he look so guilty?_ When he didn't answer me, I spoke up again.

"So, are we ready to have the conversation about the mission?" When I heard the silence again, I sighed and turned around.

"Can you report the story I told earlier?" I heard him ask in a small voice as I opened the locker and placed the mask inside. After a pause, he added, "Please."

"And why would I do that? Actually, the real question would be, why would _you_ want that?" I asked, pulling out a jacket from my locker in the meantime. There was another long pause that ensued, it seemed like I would have to do most of the talking today.

"Do you know that if an instance of insubordination resulted in an injury, the lightest punishment will be a suspension. Since you are so eager to say it out loud in front of all team members, I can't just write that story and let you off the hook. That would be negligence on my part." I sat down the bench, still glaring at him, my eyes full of criticism.

"So you better give me a damn good reason why I should lie for you, and maybe I'll think about it." Silence, silence, and silence. Why did it feel like I was yelling at a foreigner who couldn't speak my language?

"Was it pride? What, your great eyes with its 359-degree vision couldn't have made a mistake?" I was definitely getting angrier at his silence. He put me in this position and now he was using passiveness to fight everything; it was infuriating. "Accidents happen sometimes, trust me, I've had shuriken cuts from friendly fires before. If I just write down everything in detail to explain the dire situation, no one will blame you."

When he refused to answer again, that was when I decided that my limit was approaching. "You have five seconds before I leave to go write my report," I said to him coldly as I slipped on the jacket, fully ready to get out and blend into the Konoha streets.

"You can't write down the details of what happened in there." Just as I was about to open the door, he spoke up.

"No one can know the jutsu I used back then, not even a description. I can't … my clan can't know." I turned around and locked my gaze on him. I tried to determine if he was screwing with me, but the pupil-less eyes were always the worst for determining emotions from. Slowly, I walked back to the bench and sat down. I signalled for him to sit down as well, seeing that it was going to be a long conversation.

"I'm going to need more than that if I am even _considering_ omitting details. So start talking." After another moment of slight pause, he sat down as well.

"The Hyūga clan is separated into the main house and the branch house. There are many differences between the two houses, but one of them is the fact that there are some techniques that are only passed down through the main house. As a branch member, I don't get to learn those techniques." As he started the explanation, I crossed my arm in front of my chest and listened attentively.

"The technique I used during the mission, it's not taught to us through any means, but we can observe them in motion. That technique, Eight Trigram Palm Rotation, it's a defensive technique to counter the blind spot. I have been seeing the main house perform that technique for eight years, but I have never thought of trying it myself, not until you beat me using my blind spot." Perhaps, that tone was just pure spite. I still narrowed my eyes at him because of his words. The Hyūga Clan was definitely very different from the Uchiha Clan if Owl was willing to tell me this much, he must be desperate.

"Can you even do it, learning that technique through sheer observation?" I asked suddenly.

"Me, I don't know, but like I've told you before, I'm far from the most talented in my clan. One of the branch members, he learned all the Eight Trigram techniques through observation and sheer talent when he was ten. He's the pride of the branch house, our hope, even."

"I'm merely trying out that one technique, and even then, I can't control it. In a proper Palm Rotation, the size and the speed of the rotation can be thoroughly controlled, so what happened on the mission should have never happened. During that explosion, I panicked and used the first thing I could think of. For that, I'm really sorry." He eyed my broken arm, before dipping his head low apologetically.

"Did that branch member get any punishment for …" I was struggling to find the right word since 'snooping' didn't seem to be the right one, "... self-studying the techniques?"

"Neji? No. He is one of the most talented Hyūga the clan has ever seen, the Clan Head was proud of his show of strength." He paused a bit before continuing, "However, his techniques were complete and acknowledged, while mine is far from that. I used an incomplete technique that was not taught, which in turn injured an Anbu Captain. I will bring shame to the clan … and I will get punished."

I leaned back on the cold metal locker, trying to process everything I had just heard. I had made a promise not to get in any clan's business, they saw me as a nuisance and an unwelcomed surprise, and I wouldn't disagree. At that moment, I wanted to kick him again and break some joints without him fighting back.

"So you came up with a really lame excuse about insubordination and negligence? Tell me, do you even value your career in Anbu?" I exclaimed, full of disbelief. _Couldn't he have picked something else like, oh, I don't know, I tripped and fell?_ It might have made me look stupid and I would be mad at him for a long time, but at least I didn't have to deal with _this._

"Your wolf attacked me. Anyone with an eye could see that I was the cause of your injury and … I do feel responsible for it. I wasn't even controlling the rotation, if you didn't have that technique, the speed of the debris would have crushed you and collapsed the building."

I rubbed my temple, trying to ease my headache. So, what were my choices? I could stick with the truth and get it over with. To be fair, Owl's mission record might not even be read by anyone other than the Hokage.

"You still haven't answered me. Do you value your career in Anbu?" I suddenly asked, trying to figure out this man so different from me in terms of his situation in the clan. "Do you care? Because I value mine."

"I do, very much. The Branch House was born in a lower status than the Main House; we were born to be bodyguards to the main family. I might not feel happy about it from time to time, but I understand my responsibilities. If the time arises, I will protect the main family with my life. But other times, when my life is still mine, working directly under Hokage-sama is liberating. No offence, but the clan could care less if I get a minor suspension under a captain who is an Uchiha." Despite the 'no offence' and the hushed tone, I took every offence to that. He was using my family name as a tool to fool his clan, dragging me into a complicated place.

"However, if the Hyūga Clan caught word that I was learning the technique privy to the main house and failed to succeed, they can force me to resign from Anbu. I can't say no, nor do I honestly want to say no to the Main House." It was unfair that he was pleading to me. I was angry, very much so. But at the same time, I could hear the guilt and desperation leaking out of his voice.

He sounded genuine to me, or maybe he had gotten me with that speech about liberation. I supposed that he was trying to take the punishment to say sorry. The Hyūga Clan business was complicated and I had absolutely no intention of going anywhere near that. However, when in Anbu, I had every right to protect my subordinates from harassments.

"Two weeks. That's the punishment I would assign to a minor insubordination of this degree. Don't worry, I survived two months once, it will pass in the blink of an eye." Upon hearing my words, I swore his eyes shone with relief and excitement.

"Now, I have some conditions, so listen up," I said while flipping over the empty report, filling in missing information as I continued to speak. "One, I'm doing this for your sake, so if you dare to use it against me in any way, shape, or form, I will rip you apart, piece by piece, and then you will really see what the Mangekyou Sharingan can do."

"I won't. I swear on my life and my clan," he interjected immediately. I raised my head to examine him, just to make sure that he actually meant it. Feeling my critical glare, he added, "Seriously, I'm not that kind of a person." _Hn, I'll be the judge of that._

"Two, you are not to use that technique again, you're right, it's too dangerous. Now that I know you don't actually have control over it, a two-week suspension is a fair punishment for that reckless disregard for my life and my summon's." He nodded obediently, although he looked a bit disappointed at the prospect of me banning his effort in trying to learn a jutsu to cover his weak spot. With that, I let out an internal sigh.

"Don't use that technique, at least, not until you can control it. In the meantime, as long as you don't use it in _public_ , I will forget that I know anything about it." _Think about the good side, Maiko,_ I kept on telling myself, _now you have a powerful defence technique to practice your ninjutsu with._

"So, by that, you mean, I can still practice it while we are sparring privately?" He asked tentatively. _Whoa, he caught on quickly._

"I am not confirming that. Don't put words in my mouth." I defended immediately, but I knew that he was both smart and brazen enough to disregard my words. I stayed for a while longer to finish up the report while Owl watched me from the side. I could not express the amount of discomfort I was feeling when my writing was being carefully examined by the Byakugan. So by the end of the report, I was ready to kick him, punch him, do something.

"Three, get your face away from my report, it's especially creepy with the white eyes." I squeezed the words out of my mouth as I was finishing up the last page. Reluctantly, he turned his face away.

"Last chance to back out, once I send in the report, your two-week suspension starts now." I raised the finished report and asked him one last time. Firmly, he nodded, not at all wavering at the impending fate of being stuck in the village.

"Well, then, I'll see you in two weeks." I lazily waved him goodbye before stepping out of the locker room. When I was closing a door, I thought I heard a rare mutter of 'thank you'. That was the first instance of 'thank you' that I had gotten from a hostile Hyūga in ten months, and probably the only one I would hear, ever.

After I handed in the file at the Hokage's office, I dropped by the Uchiha Compound. The construction was still under way. However, with my promotion in Anbu, and therefore a promotion in salary, I was able to get more of the project done than I had expected. The roof of the main house had been changed, the burnt floor, completely refurbished, and the doors, replaced. In fact, the main house was in a livable condition if we discounted the wooden walls with several holes in them.

At night, somehow, I found myself back in the underground Anbu facility. It was two in the morning, so despite the fact that the time of the day doesn't really matter to Anbu agents, the hall was mostly empty. Those who wanted to sleep went back to their locker rooms and those who needed to leave left their locker rooms in a hurry.

So catching this time of peace and tranquillity, I was lying down on one of the benches over the railing that oversaw the training of new recruits. They were just in a middle of their first morning shift, and truly, my heart felt for them. I wondered if Hokage-sama put the Hyūga on my team for some wise reasons other than 'hey, this has never been done before'. Perhaps he was trying to test to see if this unusual cooperation could work out. Now, if Owl and I could pull that off, that would be schema-breaking.

"Are you extending your natural habitat from the locker room to the whole Anbu facility now?" I heard the familiar voice mocking me from above. Slowly, I opened my eyes, letting the mellow lights soak in. The prime reason why I liked to stay here for small rests was because of its lighting. Not too harsh and not too dim, unlike the locker room, where it was either all or nothing.

"Yes, I suppose so. Between missions, I spent over half of my time here, holed up underground." I responded with a bland tone as I awkwardly propped myself up with one arm, freeing up half of the bench for Kakashi to sit down.

"How's your new job treating you?" He asked casually, his one eye glancing down at the new recruits. They had only started their entrance training a few days ago, meaning they still had to suffer through quite a long bit of time. Thinking back on those days, I felt that it had been so long ago despite it having been only around three to four years since then.

"It's … difficult. I had to decide on some difficult choices, but it's not long enough for the outcome of my decision to sink in. So now, I am left wondering about the consequences," I answered. He wouldn't necessarily respond to my problems, but at the very least, he would listen sometimes, if I were lucky.

"I heard you hurt your arm because of a teammate, is that true?" _And this is why Owl was worried about the information leak._ Anbu was a pretty tight network since there were some problems that Anbu agents could only talk about with other agents. Besides, a suspension was not a common thing to happen and therefore, easily noticed.

"Team dynamic is a part of the issue, but then again, accidents happen and people panic. I didn't want to give out any punishments, I don't know how you would've done it," I said, half complaining, half asking for advice.

"You're in a difficult situation, I get it. Trying to prove that you are capable, fair, and of course, sane. That's why you're thinking too hard. Pick a punishment and stick with it, if it's wrong, the Hokage and the Anbu Commander wouldn't have approved of it. If it's being adjusted, then you can go back to contemplation and start to stress your brain out. Relax, you'll get a better grasp with time." His voice was very calm. Reassuring, perhaps; light-hearted, definitely.

Time, it was a magical thing. It brought change to people, to events, and to hearts. However, at the same time, time could be arbitrary in terms of quality. Three and a half years in Anbu, I wholehearted believed that it taught me more than my eighteen years in OLYMPUS did.

"I remember when you were nine, you were so abhorred by the idea of Anbu. Yet, a few years later, here you are, trying to make a life in here. Are you seeing the iron?" He teased. And yes, I did see the irony. But really, time was a magical thing, and so were people.

"Come on, let me off the hook. I was a child back then, full of prejudice gained from bedtime stories. But now, I know that those preconceived notions are not true and … I like it here," I murmured, wondering exactly when had I stopped seeing Anbu as OLYMPUS. A month in? A year in? I couldn't tell. Time was an ambiguous thing.

"Oh? And what kind of prejudice was that? Do enlighten me on the things they tell in bedtime stories. Nowadays, merciless killers seem to equate Anbu in most civilians' mind."

"It's not so much as the killer part. I've done my fair share, not that hard when you are trying to survive. It's the freedom part. As you may or may not have noticed over the years, freedom was my blind spot." I spared a glance at Kakashi, before returning the gaze at the thirty-some recruits below. They were a new generation, full of potential.

"What, you think that the Konoha Anbu is like Kiri, or …" I could tell that he dropped the last word of the sentence in a hurry, and it triggered my curiosity.

"Or what? Mind finishing the sentence?" At that point, I completely forgot the old saying that curiosity killed the cat.

"Nothing, I was just trying to think of another example, but then I realised that I don't actually know that much about other villages to care." Like usual, his excuses were as smooth as water.

"Well, then, I'm going to go home for today. It's not like I can take missions for the next two days with this arm." I fumbled around for my mask, unsure of where I had put it before. I had finally decided to give up on confidentiality. Helpfully, Kakashi grabbed the mask from the ground and placed it on my face.

During that time, I was happy. Or perhaps, a better word would be content. I was content with my life, or rather, choices in life, completely unaware of the fact that in three days, my life would be thrown into hell once more.

Danzō broke into my life three days later and before I knew it, I was already caught up in his web of truths and lies.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Hokage-sama wishes to speak to you." They caught me just as I was locking up locker room 29. They were wearing the Anbu issued black outfit, but their masks were pure white. The masks resembled the one I wore during my trainee days, but somehow, just from their composures, I was sure that the two in front of me had more than a few months' experiences under their belt.

"If that's true, then why didn't Hokage-sama summon me through the tattoo?" Without any pause, I walked past them. However, one of them shifted in front me and blocked my path.

"Hokage-sama doesn't wish for this to gain any public attention nor does he want to wait." The one in front of me said to me calmly, not a spec of emotion in his voice. I stared at him for a while, trying to figure out what he wanted. But just like his mask, he seemed like a void, with no identifiable trace on him whatsoever.

"Are you going to force me against my will?" I asked again.

"It's an order from Hokage-sama, therefore, it should be your will to follow it." _Now that would be a semi-valid argument if it actually came from Hokage-sama_. I looked around the empty Anbu facility beside the corridor, seeing no one in sight. However, if a fight were to break out, I was sure that people would rush here before I could break either of their arms. And that not only meant trouble for them but for me as well.

"Lead the way, whoever you are." Finally, I said after much thinking. First of all, there was no point having an impasse here; secondly, I would really like to know who wanted to have a word with me so bad that they would use Hokage-sama's name; and lastly, I would really like to go home after another long day at Anbu.

The two Anbu-but-maybe-not led me out of the Anbu facility through a backdoor that I didn't know existed. But before I could get a glimpse of where I actually was, they ushered me into some intricate underground tunnels.

"You are not taking me to the Hokage," I knew I was stating the obvious, but someone had to say it. They ignored me but the two of them - one in front of me and one behind - closed in the space just a bit, as if trying to prevent me from escaping.

"That was the plan, Uchiha-san. But unfortunately, Hokage-sama is currently busy, so I will be talking to you if you don't mind." _Actually, I do mind,_ but we both knew that was more of a command than a question.

Shimura Danzō stood a few metres in front of me behind a desk. Half of his body was painted black by the shadow; the other half was more or less covered in black clothes that glowed slightly yellow from the only light source in the room: a metallic desk lamp that was common in interrogation rooms.

"Elder Shimura, I would like an explanation for this meeting," I said calmly. Like always, I couldn't see any inner desires on his half-hidden face, nor could I read his motives just by the way he stood like a statue. However, that feeling of being trapped and played under his fingers never disappeared once since I had met him.

"It was nothing formal, Uchiha-san. Congratulation on the promotion, it seemed like your career is treating you well." Very slightly, he moved his hand and signalled for me to sit down on the metal chair in front of the table. After a moment of hesitation, I obliged.

"Thank you, Elder Shimura. However, I believe that you want to talk more than just my promotion." I didn't have much skill in politics, but one thing I did know was how to say the polite version of 'let's cut the crap and get to the chase.'

"Have you considered your career? Is there anything you want to accomplish?" He acted like he was oblivious to my impolite attitude and asked in a mellow voice that was a clear imitation of the Hokage. Thankfully, I had pre-choreographed an answer to this particular question.

"Nothing out of ordinary. I would like to continue to serve Hokage-sama in Anbu. I would like to rebuild the Uchiha name. Also…" _I want to find my brother and kill him._ I stopped myself immediately when I realised what I was about to say - the thought that seemed to come out of nowhere - but the abruptly cut-off line seemed awfully suspicious.

"Also?" I could see Danzō raise his visible eyebrow and suddenly, I felt so very self-conscious. _Why am I feeling like I have something to hide when he was the one that tricked me here?_

 _Also, I would like to kill my brother and take revenge._ "Nothing." That was all I could say to wrench myself out of the strange line of thought. I had no idea why I would think of something like that now, but… it felt right to say it out loud.

"What about your brother, Uchiha Itachi, don't you want to kill him for revenge? Your younger brother seemed very confident in admitting it." _I do, I really do._ I opened my mouth for the natural answer, but then the feeling of something not quite right stopped me, leaving only a hint of gagging in my voice.

"There is no need to hide, my child. It's an understandable sentiment and you can speak to me about it." _Isn't it? Is it so wrong that I want the revenge?_ The desk lamp was casting off wavering lights, and the sharp contrast between the harsh light and the overwhelming shadow was starting to give me a headache.

"Let me ask you once again, do you want revenge or not?" The way he said it, it sounded so urgent and pressing, but so smooth and trustworthy at the same time. _He is the only one who understands, and he is the only one I can talk to without being branded an outcast for showing my true emotions… right?_

"Yes…" My voice still sounded uncertain, but this time, the word finally came out.

"Good, my child. Now that you know you can trust me, tell me, is Sarutobi Hiruzen letting you do that?" _But can I really trust you?_ It sounded so wrong. Me, trusting Danzō? Was that even possible? But … I had already told him my deep dark secret. Under the dim flickering light, there was just something in the air that made my head feel like mush. Something was wrong, but I just couldn't figure out what. Before I could stop the flow, everything was pouring out.

"No, Hokage-sama refuses to tell me anything about him, nor would he tell me about any search missions. He isn't letting me do what I want, he has never trusted me anyway." I answered him, sounding way too desperate than I had ever intended. Then again, I never intended to tell him anything at all. "Sometimes, I feel like Hokage-sama is lying to me." I looked up and saw Danzō's emotionless eyes, but I could swear that I saw some sympathy and understanding.

"I think that's a mistake, don't you?" _Yes, I agree._ "I, on the other hand, think that you deserve your chance. After all, you do have the skills to counter his Sharingan, don't you?" _Yes, finally, someone understands!_

But it all just sounded so wrong. Why was I talking to him in the first place, let alone the topic of Itachi? It was the light; it was the atmosphere; it was _something_ , but before I could figure out what and clear my head, he was already pressing on.

"I would like to offer you a position, of course, you will still be in Anbu. However, you will be joining a special faction of Anbu. In there, I can provide you with information, training, personnel… all the resources you need to take your revenge." Something was so very wrong in those sentences he was feeding me. First of all, there shouldn't be any special factions within Anbu, and secondly…

I didn't want to take revenge. Revenge had never been my goal. Somewhere along our conversation, my words, or my thoughts, got twisted.

Instinctively, my eyes spun into the three tomoe and chakra flared in my circuit … Nothing changed. The elder was still sitting in front of me, amiable, harmless, guileless.

"I need an answer, my child. I don't have much time, so you need to make your decision before you leave." His mellow words only made my headache worse. Unconsciously, I brought my hands up and clutched onto my head, trying to stop the confusion.

"Make your decision now…" I could hear the echoing words, urging me to take his offer, because it was so _tempting_. I needed it, I didn't have any help, I never had any help. _So tempting… Just say yes and the headache will stop._

"Yes … I mean … I need more time to think." Eventually, I squeezed the words out of my mouth and immediately, Danzō's aura changed. The pressure, it was definitely heavier, like an adult patronising a child, telling me that I needed to apologise and say the opposite. _He is getting impatient, and I need to say yes before he casts me aside._

But no. Something was very wrong, and I couldn't say yes without my instincts telling me that I was making a huge mistake.

"This could be troublesome if you can't make up your mind, Uchiha-san. Perhaps there is something else I can offer you, regarding your brother, Sasuke." Suddenly, I raised my head and stared at Danzō, his expression was still as empty as ever. No sign of smugness, confidence, or greed. But, something had changed. _Didn't someone else also try to use Sasuke to tempt me before?_ Yes, Orochimaru, and things ended really badly for him.

"I heard from Hiruzen that he needs protection, from Orochimaru and many others. I can offer that protection which the Hokage can't, or is unwilling to, if you put him in my care. The faction can protect him 24/7, and my offer for training applies to him as well." His words were like a bucket of cold water pouring over my body, and it washed off every bit of confusion I had ever had.

It was so clear now that something was very wrong. Because there was no way that I would give Sasuke to him. I would _never ever_ let Shimura Danzō, that spider full of avarice, touch my brother.

"Stop talking." I cut him off with a voice as cold as ice. "What did you do to my mind." It was not a question; it was a statement. From the way his mouth widened slightly before returning back to its original state, I'd say that he definitely did something to screw with my head.

"Nothing, my child. These are all your deepest desires, your truthful confessions, are they not?" He stared back at me with feigned innocence, as if this was all my fault.

"If you want to twist my words, at least get your facts straight," I mocked and stood up from the metallic chair. The two men who led me here tensed and rested their hands on their weapons, but I ignored them and kept my eyes on the one who orchestrated all of this.

"I don't want to kill Itachi because I don't believe that what you told me is all there is. I will find out the truth behind the massacre, and if you try to pull something like this again, I will not forgive so easily like this time." Actually, I wasn't even planning to forgive him this time, but at the moment, I needed to leave this hellhole. Slowly, Danzō stood up as well and his ailing figure towered over me. I stood my ground and bravely stared back, although I was very aware of the sounds of blades being drawn behind me.

"Be careful with your words, girl. Your confidence may very well become arrogance and bring about your downfall, just like your clan. I will ask one more time, will you join me or not?" His voice exerted a sense of control, trying to pressure me like before and turn my brain back into that pot of mush. But it wouldn't work this time. Never again.

"No thank you, Elder Shimura. Now if you'll excuse me, I will take my leave." After dropping my last words, I turned around and moved towards the exit. Immediately, one of the masked men appeared in front of me with a blade blocking my path. _Really, you plan to stop me with one sword?_ Before the man could look away, my eyes had already connected with his. A second later, he dropped to the ground as his body spasmed.

"Lead our guest out, Dajimu. Uchiha-san, I believe that it is for your benefit not to talk to anyone about our meeting. After all, there were secrets spilt in here." When I heard his unconcerned words with that hint of mockery, I almost wanted to smash him apart just like I did with Orochimaru. _Secrets? You mean the words you tricked me into saying while you were playing around with my mind?_

Nevertheless, I needed to get out of here. I still couldn't figure out what he had done to my head, and staying here was just asking for myself to be controlled again. Without looking at his fallen partner, the other Anbu bowed to Danzō and led me out of the dark corridors.

The moment I was back in the Anbu facility and left alone by Danzō's lackey, I leaned back onto the wall and let the dread wash over me.

 _I almost fell into his trap. I was so close to losing control of my own mind._ Even now, my brain was in a state of haziness. If that statement about Sasuke didn't backfire, I really didn't know what would have happened. All these emotions that I stopped feeling years ago, just five minutes with him, and they had all returned. The anger, the betrayal, the insecurity, and the desperation. One sentence and he had triggered them all.

"What just happened?" I mumbled to myself, trying to make sense of what the hell I was thinking. I blinked again, this time, more forceful in exerting chakra from my eyes to the brain. Still, I couldn't feel anything wrong in my chakra circuit. No sign of genjutsu or foreign chakra.

 _Then why am I doing everything I can to resist the urge of going back to Elder Shimura and beg for forgiveness, despite realising how ludicrous that was? What is wrong with me?_

"What the hell just happened?" That seemed to be all that I could say, but it was the one question that I didn't have an answer to.

* * *

A/N: so here we have Danzō. Kotoamatsukami is very vague to me, so I have to come up with some more details on how it works. I believe that Danzō's Koto is much much weaker than Shisui's due to it being a transplant, therefore, while Shisui can affect a whole Clan using two eyes with absolute compulsion, Danzō's version is crap (remember this is like four years before when Danzoō used it on Mifune, therefore, his own lack of understanding also plays a part). Since Koto puts thoughts in one's mind, I think it has to be plausible to some degree for it to work, at least when Danzō is using his one eye diluted version. It worked on Mifune because he is impartial and therefore the command of 'choosing Danzō' is very plausible and therefore easily accepted. However, Maiko's very biased from the beginning and therefore, Danzō's koto is not undetectable. Some people describe a person's action as having three part: instinct (the heart), thoughts (mind), and the body, and based on my understanding of Koto, it affects the mind, the thoughts and therefore a good one will override the heart and control the body, but a forced one will alert the individual of inconsistency between the three parts. Does that make sense?

Oh, also, the next chapter will probably take two weeks, I'm not sure. I have several exams next week along with a baggage of study materials for the final final exams...


	37. Chapter 37 - Root of the Lies

A/N: so I have a long chapter (another one over 10000!) to make up for two weeks of absence. Beta'd by Alice J who was nice enough to accommodate my habit of procrastination and beta at the last moment.

* * *

Chapter 37 - Root of the Lies

I raised my fist in front of the door, ready to knock on the apartment whose sole occupant probably wouldn't welcome me all that much. Before I could decide on the volume of my knocking, the door was opened abruptly. Judging by the annoyance on his face, I had probably interrupted his session with his precious novels.

"Really, Maiko? It's one in the morning," Kakashi complained, still as grumpy as ever. "What could possibly be so important that it can't wait until morning, or even better, next week."

"Shimura Danzō." The two words that came out of my mouth were barely louder than a whisper, but it was definitely enough to guarantee a reaction. Before I could continue, he had already pulled me into the apartment and locked the door. He dragged me inside so violently that I would have stumbled and crashed onto the floor had I not steadied myself with the wall.

"Was there anyone following you?" All the annoyance and laziness in his voice disappeared and they were replaced by seriousness I hadn't heard in a long time.

"I don't know. I made two shadow clones before I came here. I sent one of them back to Shun's apartment and the other to the Uchiha Compound. I tried my best to hide my presence, but I don't know if it worked," I answered honestly. I saw Kakashi's expression settle into that of concentration. After a few seconds, he shook his head slowly.

"I can't smell anyone foreign, but try to keep your voice down." Compared to the solemnness of his voice, I nodded rather absentmindedly. His living room was as empty and bland as usual, with a bluish-grey wallpaper that looked more grey than blue at the moment, making the room feel more desolate than normal.

When I brought all my fleeting attention back to the owner of the apartment, I found him looking at me expectantly. Right, I was supposed to talk to him about Danzō. _But I don't want to talk about him anymore because it's like a trigger for something 'unsafe' and it makes me afraid._

It was a good thing that I stopped myself before sprouting those embarrassing words, but I wasn't sure that staying frozen among the gaping silence was any better.

"What's wrong?" Vaguely, I heard his question, so I shook my head and closed my eyes just to calm down a bit. Whatever Danzō did, it scared me, I would admit that much. It was like my mind was being snatched away and he was the sole light that led me by a thin wire. The worst part was, those thoughts sounded so real and logical that I had actually believed them.

"Danzō, I saw him earlier, or should I say, he forced me into a 'meeting' as he called it. He wanted me to join this special faction in Anbu. I don't know what he did, but I almost said yes, despite knowing that he was up to no good." I said as calmly as possible, knowing that what happened still gave me the chills.

"What do you mean you almost said yes? Did he brand you already?" _Brand, what?_ What Kakashi asked didn't make sense, and it didn't help that he sounded more worried than he had ever been on the topic of me.

"No, I don't know what you're talking about. But, I said things… and thought things I would never think of usually. At that moment, it had all made sense, but only after I'd said it, I would realize what had just happened." I answered, just barely reigning in my anger so I wouldn't burst into a cursing fit. _Whoa, before it was fear, and now anger? I'm having a great day._

"What exactly did you say?" Kakashi asked with a raised eyebrow. _Yes, I would like to know that as well._

"I didn't say much, but for some reason, I told him that I wanted to kill Itachi, and I sort of bitched a bit about Hokage-sama." I could just imagine Kakashi's silent wince as he covered his face with hands, but I ignored that and continued. "It was not so much as what I had said, but more so what I had thought. I swear, for a few seconds, I genuinely thought he was the best person to lay down my trust with. He was screwing with my mind, big time, and I had no idea how he was doing it." This time, I really couldn't control my emotions anymore, and before I knew it, I had already punched his coffee table and let the loud crashing sound reverberate throughout the room.

"I'm sorry, I can't control my emotions right now." I apologized hastily, grabbing onto my fist to stop it from doing any more stupid things. My thoughts, my actions, they were all scrambled up now, blurring the line between reality and imagination.

"It's fine. Why don't you sit down, and next time punch something soft, like the couch. Have you checked your chakra system? It might be a genjutsu." I followed his advice and sat down on the couch as I shook my head promptly.

"I tried the regular genjutsu kai, and my Sharingan wasn't picking up anything unusual. The mind control thing, these fake thoughts, I can clearly distinguish them now, because all I've got for Danzō is disgust. But I can't stop them from occurring along with a shit ton of emotions that I can't control. I'm feeling so angry that I want to smash Danzō's head apart; I'm scared out of my mind because I'm afraid that he can control me again, and I'm obviously way too anxious, seeing that I am pouring it all on you…" My voice faded little by little as the stress took over. I was sure that somewhere along the line, Danzō had exploited my negative emotions for his own purposes, but the question was how.

"The heightened state of emotions, it might be drugs. Danzō's secret faction, Root, is very good at mind control, eliciting and suppressing emotions. The atmosphere, the lighting, and the drug in the air, they can all accentuate your emotions and maybe even screw with your mind." Kakashi said calmly, his voice sounded so steady, like a stone anchored amongst wild waves, dragging me back from the brink of exhaustion.

"Root? Is that the name of his web?" I asked.

"Yes, Danzō picks talented shinobi, Anbu or orphan, it doesn't matter. He trains them to be merciless and erases their emotions and they listen to no one but him. It used to be a legal organization back in the days, but now it's more like Danzō's personal army. It's a good thing that you resisted because it takes a lot more than a 'no' to get out of it." Kakashi explained mockingly, but I could hear the bitter tone in his voice, that faint lingering regret. Suddenly, I realized, it would make sense if he had been recruited by Danzō before. It would explain his knowledge and it would also explain his strong opinion about me staying away from Danzō.

"He is not going to let go, is he? He doesn't seem like the forgiving type, and I'm sure that I pissed him off when I told him to stay the fuck away from me, not that I said it in those exact words though." I asked in a light voice. There was a period of silence as Kakashi hesitated. After years with him, I was definitely getting better at reading his expressions. Right now, his hesitation wasn't about the answer, but it was more like he was debating on how to gently break the news to me. Sure enough, he nodded slightly, confirming my unease.

"Do something for me. I need to get a sense of how screwed up you are." _Probably very._ I raised an eyebrow at him as he continued. "When I ask you something, tell me the first thought that comes to mind. Don't fight it, no matter what you think, just tell me."

I stared at him for a second, unsure if this was a good idea. "I won't judge, promise." I supposed that this settles the deal, so I nodded compliantly. As soon as he got my permission, the short, succinct questions started; it felt like a game of truth and dare - just without the dares … and the presumed truths were not necessarily truths.

"Your name?"

"Uchiha Maiko."

"Age?"

"Almost sixteen." _Okay, so far, I'm still sane._

"Tell me about Sasuke." Whoa, he really got to the point right away. So likewise, I followed through on my part of the bargain.

"I can't protect him." I began to wish that I hadn't agreed in the first place because I was already regretting it.

"And Itachi," he prompted without batting an eye.

"Revenge." I wanted to stop, but nevertheless, I finished the thought as promised. "He took everything from me."

"What about Hokage-sama?" Hah, that one! My thoughts weren't so bad for that one.

"I have sworn my allegiance to him, forever. But there was always a nagging feeling that he's lying to me, about something important." Actually, that sounded quite bad. The Hokage was the leader of the whole village. He was a military leader, to put it nicely. However, to put it even more plainly, every Kage was a dictator whose single-handed decisions could start a war or end one.

This was why Danzō was unsettling. Have you ever seen someone try to divide power from a position that doesn't share power in the first place? That was usually the start of a civil rebellion.

Thankfully, he really didn't judge. I wondered if he was treating this like an interrogation - no, not an interrogation, that would imply that I had the potential to give out useful information, not this useless crap that was filling my subconsciousness.

"And Shimura Danzō?" See, this one, I had the most control in tuning it out because of the sheer amount of rejection for the thought. Yet, at the same time, it was the strongest thought that resonated in my mind.

"He is the one that can help me achieve my revenge. He can give me what everyone else couldn't." It was simply terrifying, hearing the words that were leaving my mouth.

"Damn."

Damn was the right word. Yep, I was very screwed up.

"Just out of curiosity, any distortions about me that I should know about?" I raised an eyebrow at his question. _Doesn't he realise that it's dangerous to share these thoughts?_

"I don't think that's a good idea," I mumbled hesitantly. It was different to share your most disastrous thoughts about someone when they were right in front of you.

"Whatever these thoughts were, they were triggered by a certain topic - or a certain name. Therefore, it was always better to know exactly what topic was distorted. A bit impractical seeing the complexity of human mind and the amount of information it could hold, but the most immediate threat is always a good place to start. Let it out, so if it starts to resurface, you'll know they are fake. We need to know what we're dealing with here, so say them exactly as you have thought of them, I told you I won't judge. Pretty sure you've already used all the insults you could possibly think of on me anyway." I couldn't deny the logic, so reluctantly, I searched in my mind, grasping for that dangerous parasite, feeding on my old memories.

"Captain …" I slipped into the habit, " … you let my genin teammate die."

Silence. I raised my head and I saw a shocked eye before Kakashi turned his head away. _What happened to no judging?_ Literally, I shared my (wait, they weren't even mine) darkest thoughts with him, what happened to having a bit of faith? He should know that I would never blame him for what happened to Daichi; he should trust me on that.

"We need to get you to Hokage-sama right now, and maybe have a Yamanaka look at your head … add a drug test on that list as well." Just like that, the crack resurfaced for less than a second before it was hastily patched up and covered again. He knew it was fake; all of these things were fake. I had to believe that he was definitely smart enough to see that.

"Now? First of all, it's past midnight, the Hokage wouldn't even be in his office unless the village were under attack. And second, I don't think I'm in the best mentality to accuse a village Elder in front of the Hokage. You heard the distorted thoughts, it would be like adding incoherence to an absurd testimony and then off to the interrogation unit I go." Pause, think. I sounded … angry, much too distrustful of the Hokage.

"You have a good point, but can you last for another six hours?" _A very good question._

"Yes, I have to," I answered with determination as I stood up and walked towards the door. Mind tricks were scary because they were intangible, but my mind wasn't some playdough Danzō could just manipulate without a single ounce of resistance.

"I'll come find you at six. Who knows, maybe it's just drugs and it'll be out of your system by tomorrow morning." That was a pathetic attempt at easing my worries. I could tell from his face that even he didn't believe that.

In the face of the unknown, my determination flickered as I reach out for the doorknob. Beyond this door, there would be nothing but darkness. No seals and no traps to protect me from Danzō, and I knew that he could get to me through so many different methods. I hadn't felt so afraid since my encounter with Orochimaru, this acute fear that froze me; this feeling in which I knew a trap was coming, yet I couldn't get myself to avoid it.

 _I don't want to open the door. I don't want to leave and face nothing but fear. I want to stay here, where I have people I can trust. I want to stay right here, where I know it's safe._

 _So is this fear programmed by Danzō? Or is it just me?_

"Are you sure that you can last that long?" Kakashi asked as his eye flickered between my frozen, outstretched hand and the door with suspicion. I had hoped that he wouldn't sense my fear, but who was I kidding? If Pakkun could smell my sorrow when it was just a small leak, then Kakashi could definitely pick up the fear that was coursing through me like a flood.

"They are not real, you know." I suddenly spoke up, but it was more for my sake than to answer him. "They may sound real, but all well-woven lies have some fragments of reality that they build on - rule number one of framing a genjutsu. In the end, they are just lies, and I won't let them dictate my actions."

"You pushed me to answer under the pretense of a safe and confidential environment, and I did, so don't hold me accountable for the lies that weren't even mine." With a sudden stroke of anger (a great alternative to fear, by the way), I pointed at his chest defiantly. "I'm fighting them, resisting them, and you should flush them down the drain as well."

"Noted. Be careful," Eventually, he replied as I pushed the apartment door open. The wind, it was definitely more chilling than usual, and the darkness, well, it had never really changed.

 _So stop feeling afraid._

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

 _Pop!_ That imaginary sound signalled the return of my second shadow clone. The first one was popped quickly as soon as I got back to the apartment to take its place. An hour later, the second one I made for the Uchiha Compound dispersed itself after dragging out boxes of wires and shuriken and trapping the entire place.

Having no cares about chakra preservation, I laid down genjutsu traps every two steps. If anyone tried to sneak into the compound (notably, Root), they would get a really nasty paralysis from the genjutsu before acquiring a porcupine costume made from senbon, kunai, and shuriken.

 _Mhm, no sign of any suspicious personnel and a third of my chakra has just disappeared._ I thought silently as I digested the information my shadow clone relayed back to me. _Stop being so paranoid!_ I screamed at myself internally. No trouble was good, there was no point to go and wishing for trouble.

However, something was wrong with this situation regarding the Hokage, Danzō, and Root. There was no way that the Hokage wouldn't know of Danzō's activity, not when Kakashi could explain the MO of Root backward to me. Therefore, either Root was a division that was unofficially sanctioned, or the Hokage had closed an eye on Root for various reason. Either way, there was a carefully conserved power balance between the two - the Hokage had to be careful of Root's reach, while Danzō would have to be on a constant look out because there were no guarantees for his organization.

Oh dear, ignorance really was a bliss. Although, logically speaking, if the above case were true, then it would be the best situation for me because the mere presence of little me wouldn't be able to upset that carefully established homeostasis between the Hokage and Elder Shimura. The Hokage would order Danzō to leave me alone and I would most likely get a 'shut-up' order. A bit infuriating, but it would definitely be the most trouble-free solution.

The moonlight cast a wavering shadow on the couch, barely illuminating the dark room. Well, in a week or so, I was going to move out anyway.

The main house in the Uchiha compound had been completely fixed, and I was just waiting for the wall paint to dry. Shun had already found a place near the Intelligence Division with Inoichi-san's help, so he had already moved. Meanwhile, the bookcase, working desk, and my old bed - which I haven't been able to sleep on for forever - got taken apart, ready to be transported once the paint had dried, leaving only this sofa bed that I was planning to sell once moving back. Yoshino-san had graciously taken in Sasuke for a week while I was sorting out the move, but right now, I wasn't sure moving back was a good idea, seeing that I had just feverishly changed the compound into a death trap due to paranoia.

My heart nearly skipped a beat when I felt a presence approaching the staircase, the steps light and fast. Shinobi. Immediately, I picked up a kunai with a strand of wire attached to the handle - some leftovers from the earlier trapping session.

I was fully prepared to make a hole in someone's head if the wrong person had appeared, but then I heard the clicking of a key being fitted into the locks. The heartbeat returned, but I still kept the kunai light on my fingers. It was only when the door opened without any malice that I flicked the kunai away from the sight.

"Why are you running?" I asked as my soon-to-be-ex-roommate appeared with slightly hitched breathing.

"I'm not sure, but I think you should read this before seven." Shun didn't waste any time before throwing a pile of stapled papers in my face. Despite the ominous phrasing, I grabbed the files and started the examination.

"What the hell!" I totally did not just yell that out. "They are demolishing the Naka Shrine?"

"Judging from that expression, I'm guessing that no one has told you about this." _I wouldn't be screaming if they did,_ I thought as Shun closed the door behind him to prevent me from waking up the entire building.

I flipped through the pages, noting the important bullet points highlighted by Shun. "Can they even do that? Naka Shrine has been my family's shrine for generations, just because … just because … " _Oh, actually, they can. That's right, the Uchiha have fallen._

"It's been annexed by Konoha some years ago, Maiko, since the council ruled it as not being part of the Uchiha District for some reason," Shun explained with a hint of pity. "Three months ago, the patrol reported severe damage to the structure of the shrine, so it's been deemed a public safety hazard. Also, since it's right next to the border, the fallen debris is obstructing the village patrol."

"Look at the date of when the demolition order was issued." Shun flipped the file back to page one for me and I followed his finger. _March._ That was three months ago. "It said that the previous owner - you - had been notified one month prior to the date of the demolishing, which is today, so that you can move out all relevant possessions before, well, the construction company go and flatten the buildings."

"I think I would remember if someone had notified me about the decision to mow over my family shrine! How did you find this report?" I asked, frantically flipping through the report again just in case there was something else the Konoha council wanted to destroy.

"I was archiving the reports today. Normally, I wouldn't have noticed this report since it's technically not considered shinobi affairs, but the name 'Naka Shrine' reminded me of that one time when you had asked me about its location, so I decided to take a look at the report." I did inquire about the shrine a year ago before the whole Orochimaru thing had happened. I only went to look at it once before being called away. Let's just say that after that mission, my mind wasn't quite on the Naka Shrine anymore.

"And the Hokage approved of this?" I inquired with disbelief, despite seeing the Hokage's stamp and signature clearly in front of my face.

"I checked the records of the construction company. Yes, a contract was indeed made about a month ago after the date of demolition was determined with Hokage-sama's approval and the government's deposit. There was also a C-rank mission assigned to a team of chunin to help with any potential traps. However, I then checked the D-rank missions issued by the courier system; a message of an unknown topic was due to be sent to you a month ago from the Hokage's office, but it was retracted before it could be sent out. You're moving, but you've never mentioned once about cleaning out the Shrine, I just thought it was weird." I couldn't help but applaud a bit at Shun's thorough research, always the one who was able to present all the evidence.

Everything seemed to suggest that I had been deliberately left out of this matter with Naka Shrine. The only person who could have done that was from Konoha's higher hierarchy and the most obvious person was the Hokage-sama. Perhaps he thought that the matter was too personal for me and he would be right. I would have fought for the shrine because it wasn't something that I had the right to give up.

 _But what if there's something in there that the Hokage didn't want me to find out about?_ Everything was so 'hush-hush' with regards to the Uchiha Clan after the massacre. Of course, I didn't mind that most of the time, so I just let it be. If Shun hadn't mentioned it, I probably wouldn't have found out, at least not until the completion of the demolition order. After all, Naka Shrine was nothing but an empty shell of memories that I had long forgotten the existence of.

The guilt for my negligence stung like a thousand needles, but it also made me determined to do something about it. Quickly, I grabbed a few more projectiles threaded with wires from the piles at my feet. Within a few seconds, I had a pouch packed with lethal weapons and other shinobi gear.

"You are going to the shrine, aren't you?" I gave Shun an 'isn't it obvious' look as he facepalmed.

"You see, there aren't any scrolls in the Compound about the Mangekyou Sharingan, so I might as well try my chances at the shrine before it gets reduced to wooden splinters." The excuse rolled off of my tongue easily. It wasn't a lie, but the last time I had checked, the place looked like it was pillaged, so empty that it would surely incur the displeasure of any God it used to worship.

"Can't you wait until morning? If you ask the Hokage-sama for an extension, he might …" It seemed that he had reached the same conclusion that I had. A project that was already decided months ago wouldn't be postponed on such short notice. Besides, if it really was the Hokage who didn't want to notify me, then I would have no chance of stopping the demolition. If I wanted to get anything from the Shrine before it was turned into land fillings, I only had a few hours left before sunrise.

But what was I looking for in an empty Shrine? Only the Gods would know. Perhaps, I only needed a reason to stubbornly hang onto what's left, as though I would regret it if I didn't go there before it was gone forever.

"Konoha may own the land, but that shrine along with every last candle left in it belongs to my clan, so I'll salvage whatever is left of it, even if they are just 'useless things' as the Konoha council called them when they made the decision without telling me," I said with quite a bit of spite in my voice.

"I should have expected this …" My friend complained, but then, he asked, "Pass me a few projectile weapons, please." Immediately, I knew what he was implying.

"Aren't you on a shift right now?" I asked with a raised eyebrow. There was a reason why I didn't want to involve Shun in this. The Hokage wasn't the only one who could stop my access to the Shrine. If I remembered correctly, Danzō had already gained control of the Konoha Police station and he did try to gain the Uchiha Compound as well. A weird and frightful thing had happened earlier this night, and with even the slightest chance that this event was related, I didn't want Shun to be involved.

"Someone needs to make sure that you don't do something rash like trapping the place so that the construction company can't get close," Shun rebutted in a bland tone, still holding his hand out.

"Inoichi-san will kill you if you abandoned a shift and didn't finish organising the reports." When I made no move of wanting to hand him any weapons, he just walked in and took the weapons himself. It seemed like that there really was no convincing him here.

"Fine, I'll give in. Do you know how to make a shadow clone?" With no other choice, I suggested an alternative.

"You insult me," Shun answered with displeasure. Of course, how could an information specialist not know how to make a shadow clone? It was the most convenient way of gathering information.

"You can send a clone with me if you want. This way, you can pass a message if I ever do find the need for a storage scroll." With my own chakra level at a little more than half the usual after my earlier boost of paranoia, I really didn't feel comfortable making another one of myself on the same day. Although, I seriously doubted that I would actually need a storage scroll, based on my previous observations of the shrine.

But still, Shun made the hand seals for a standard shadow clone as I buckled the sword belt tightly around my waist. When I turned my attention to the door again, I saw two copies of Shun scrunching their eyebrows in concentration.

After much contemplation, one of them asked, "You're going to make me pay for the storage scroll, aren't you?"

"Yep."

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Your Clan held meetings in a place like _this_?" Shun asked with disbelief as I kicked rubble aside from the entrance. To say that the Shrine was old was an understatement. The torii gate at the entrance was creaking and swaying slightly in rhythm with the wind and all the paint on the shrine walls had peeled off, showing the sad colour of grey underneath. It was hard to imagine that the once prideful Uchiha clan would ever set foot in it.

"I'm sure it was in a better condition when my clan was still around," I said casually. The shrine had been in a better condition a year ago when I last came, but still not by much. It took us quite a while to navigate the complex terrain surrounding the shrine, so if we wanted to get it done before sunrise, then we should probably hurry.

"Let's go inside first, I might have missed something the last time I came here," I proposed. Without any more complaints, we set foot into the desolate shrine that radiated penury and abandonment.

The inside, it was just so… empty. There were really no words to describe it other than empty. The main hall was lined with dusty tatami mats, but there were barely any decorations inside which made me wonder if this had really been a shrine for worship. Last time, my investigation had ended here, barely scratching the surface before my attention was divided elsewhere.

However, something was definitely different from the last time that I had seen this place. For starters, there was a huge hole in the back wall of the shrine where a decaying tree had fallen, stuck in the middle. I was lucky that the shrine was quite big and durable so that one fallen tree wouldn't completely collapse it. But a few more trees … _Yeah, okay, I can see the point about it being a public safety hazard._

After a few moments of shock, I returned my gaze to the rest the shrine - the not destroyed, but still dusty parts. Tatami mats, the only things in the damned place, not even a candle or a statue for worship was left. _So why the hell was my clan 'worshipping' in this place?_

Slowly, I bent down and traced my fingers over the tatami mats, looking for some kind of trap or trigger. The hall was so empty, so if there was anything worth hiding, it would be hidden by one of these tatami mats that had been left despite the fact that all the other shrine artifacts were removed.

 _I wonder…_ I lifted my fingers from the mats and saw the thick layer of dust gathered on my fingertips. _This is going to be stupid if it doesn't work, so here we go._ I grabbed the corner of the mat and flipped it over in an abrupt motion. As Shun coughed and cursed because of the sudden heavy storm dust motes that had been stirred up, I walked around and flipped over all the other mats without hesitation.

"First of all, a warning would be nice next time. Second, what is this?" Following Shun's voice, I walked over to where he stood. My eyes widened at the sight in front of me: a giant slab of stone was embedded in the stone floor, nothing unusual, except for the fact that there was a large Sharingan symbol engraved in the middle of it.

"My clan's secret," I answered instinctively, not sure where it came from. Over the last two years, my obsession with the Uchiha massacre had definitely waned a bit after my near-death experience with Orochimaru. Shisui was right that there was more to life than a single path of obsession. But this sight in front of me, I felt like I was very close to uncovering a dangerous secret that I had been searching for a very long time.

 _And it just has to be now, when I am not even trying to search for it; when I wish nothing would happen. Things don't get more ironic than this._ My fingers trembled a bit as I touched the slab of stone. I traced the lines of scribbled black ink at the top all the way to the middle, where the black Sharingan laid. This was a seal, no doubt about it, but the problem was how to activate it. _Sharingan, the clue can't get more obvious._

Immediately, I looked closer and locked my eyes with the lifeless eye on the stone. For a second, nothing seemed to happen, but then, the inked eye began to spin. The black lines extending off of the Sharingan swiftly moved around and formed instructions. Not wasting a moment, I brought my hands together and started to make hand signs following the ever-shifting instructions on the stone slab.

It took a whole five minutes for the Sharingan to stop spinning. With the completion of the last hand sign, the stone slab made a loud 'thud'. With some strange mechanism, the stone was popped out of the place and began to slide over the floor to the side with a loud and scratchy noise before it finally stopped, revealing a staircase leading to a hidden basement level of the shrine.

"Nevermind, I can definitely imagine your clan meeting in a place like this," Shun mumbled from behind, but I just ignored him and stepped into the dark underneath. It had some pull in it, like an unexplained attraction, urging me to go down and uncover what I had left behind.

"My clan… my father, my mother…" _They all sat here in this dark room lit only by torches,_ I thought with a newfound awe as I surveyed the basement floor. The twin Uchiha insignias proudly stood on the wall, greeting all the descendants who dared to venture down. Right now, even I, who had very little attachment to the clan, couldn't help but feel a sense of respect and pride because of my clan, my bloodline, my Sharingan.

At that moment, it was as if I had forgotten everything about what I came here for as I was completely immersed within this bubble of nostalgia.

My eyes rested on the giant piece of stone monument placed in between the two Uchiha fans. _The things that are written on it… I want to read it._ I stepped closer and closer to the stone tablet until I was only a few inches away from it. _Was this the secret? The secret that I had longed for, but it's right here, so painstakingly simple._

' _The three-tomoe Sharingan can be evolved into a more powerful form, the Mangekyou Sharingan, by witnessing the death of a loved one. With the great power of the Mangekyou Sharingan however, there is a price. The continual usage of such power will result in the fading of vision until there is permanent blindness…'_

The words were cut off here and I was a bit disappointed. These were all facts that Father had told me before, which I was sure of now that this was where it came from. But there had to be more, right? The words didn't end here, yet the rest were like a fuzzy jumble that I couldn't interpret.

"Are you seeing a jumble of nonsense like I am, or does the Sharingan allow you to see something I don't?" Again, Shun's well-timed complaints broke me out of my daze. _Wait, did he say that the Sharingan allows me to see something he can't?_

The Mangekyou Sharingan was the key to the rest. The moment I realised that, I activated my Mangekyou. After a few seconds, some of the remaining sentences cleared up and started to assemble themselves into actual words. Without a second of delay, I continued to read.

' _The power of Mangekyou varies between users. However, one thing in common lies with its enhanced genjutsu ability. It is so great that even the tailed-beasts, the most powerful creatures since the beginning of mankind, can be controlled by it.'_

Now that was something new I hadn't heard of. Suddenly, my mind went to Naruto, the cheerful ball of orange that my brother had somehow befriended. _Does anyone know that the Mangekyou Sharingan can control the tailed-beasts, in other words, Naruto?_ If they knew, then why would they willingly let Naruto hang out with Sasuke, who had the potential to activate the Mangekyou? Or me, who had already activated it? I knew that the majority of the village couldn't care less about Naruto the boy, but they definitely cared about the nine-tail inside of him.

' _The legendary Clan Leader of the Uchihas, Uchiha Madara, eventually reached a solution for the blinding effect of Mangekyou Sharingan. By transplanting the eyes of his younger brother, Izuna, into himself, two Mangekyou were able to become one. This method allowed Madara to gain the Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan, which is void of the side effects experienced by the regular ones.'_

And that was it. No matter how hard I tried to squint my eyes at the last few paragraphs, they remained to be a bunch of jumbled nonsense. _Why? Do I have to have the next evolution of Mangekyou to read the rest? But what is it, the Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan, or something else?_

Suddenly, a horrifying thought came into my mind. All of this information written on the tablets, even though they sounded perfectly innocent like some textbook, the methods in which it described the Mangekyou and the Eternal Mangekyou, they were very ambiguous. Witnessing the death of a loved one and killing a loved one; transplanting a sibling's eyes and stealing them… The fine line between these actions was left ambiguous in the texts. Without the rest of the texts, there was no way to find clarification for it.

 _So did Itachi kill the clan for the power of the Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan? No, I can't believe that. He left me alive with my eyes intact, if there were one person whose eyes were the most suited for him, it would be mine. Maybe it was the clan, they were always seeking for power to rejuvenate the clan position. As brutal as the tablet sounds, I honestly wouldn't put it past the elders._

 _So is this what made Itachi snap? The immoral decisions of the Clan elders? Sasuke did tell me that Itachi had said: "_ I've lost all hope for this pathetic clan" _... Wait, no, let's not jump to the conclusion just yet. The entirety of Itachi's actions could be a mere façade, and would something like this really make him snap into massacre mode?_

"Maiko, what is this?" Vaguely, I heard Shun's ghostly voice, but I was too concentrated on the tablet in front of me to care. After a few seconds of no response, Shun must have felt very annoyed because the next thing I knew, he had already dragged me over to the side by my shoulder until I saw a small wooden shelf in front of me.

"What the hell are you doing? Can't you see I'm busy?" I might have sounded just a bit too unappreciative than I had imagined. But as I eyes trailed on the stone tablet, unwilling to leave, Shun's next sentence forced my attention away.

"Obviously something has gotten into you somehow. You are so obsessed with something that you can't even pay attention to your surroundings, which is why I think coming here was a horrible idea in the first place. And what makes it even worse is this." Shun, who was standing by the only bookshelf in his enormous basement, threw something at me and I caught it immediately. It was a scroll, but unlike the other scrolls on the shelf, this one looked very new without a speck of dust on it. When I opened it with a suspicious gaze, I widened my eyes in shock and fear. Because something was horribly wrong with this sight I was seeing.

The scroll was full of information on Anbu missions, missions that I knew about and missions that I didn't. The mission in Kirigakure where I met Terumi Mei was on here, despite the fact that she had burned the documents and I never told a single soul. There were also some other missions that I had no idea had happened, but they all involved foreign nations in some way, shape, or form, meaning that if any of this got leaked, Konoha would get into a lot of trouble. The worst part, it was all in my handwriting.

"Why is there classified information in your family shrine - where it would be easy to leave Konoha because of its location - and in your writing? Also, I clearly remembered that this basement is only accessible with Sharingan, and there are only three Sharingan users in the whole village." Shun's analysis chilled me to the bones, but he wasn't finished. "If they were to demolish the Shrine tomorrow, they would sure find that not-so-discreet entrance with a freaking Sharingan engraved on it. All they need to do is to summon a couple of sealing practitioners, or just Hatake, and then all of this illegal information would be exposed."

"Give me an explanation, Maiko. You've been acting strange with paranoia all the way from the apartment to the shrine. Are you being mind controlled or under a genjutsu?" _Mind control, maybe, but definitely not about this._ But before I could speak, I felt his chakra invade my brain circuit, trying to drive out any foreign chakra. With a flare of anger, I pushed him out of my mind

"It wasn't me," I shouted out each word with swirling frustration as I grabbed onto his shoulder to keep him from panicking.

"I've never set foot in the shrine for the past year, but this couldn't have been here for more than a few days." I couldn't blame him for wanting an explanation for this messed-up situation because it looked really bad. As a trained shinobi with all the naivety removed from an early age, it was his job to make sure that all possibilities were accounted for. That earlier attempt at genjutsu breaking was his way of trying to make sure I was not compromised by an external force.

"If I had anything to hide, I wouldn't allow you to follow me here," I said with a clear voice, but at the same time, the gear in my brain was turning a million miles an hour trying to figure out what purpose was there in Shun and I finding out this scroll of illegal information.

"Holy shit, I'm being framed," I whispered as realisation dawned on my face. _Why hadn't I thought of this before?_ I underestimated Danzō, I thought that he was still trying to hypnotise me somehow, but unbeknownst to me, he had already thought of other ways to get rid of me.

Shun stayed silent for a moment, most likely assessing the validity of my claim. It was a bold one, with one primary flaw being that only I had the Sharingan, the rank, and the information about this place to set this basement up as a hiding spot. But still, I could hear myself screaming internally, _Believe me! Believe me! Believe me!_

"Then we need to get this scroll back to the Hokage before anyone sees you. After that, a mind swipe will get you cleared of everything." _Ah, he believed me,_ I wanted to sigh with relief. If Shun really didn't trust me, then he would definitely probe me first before deciding the next course of action.

However, my relief didn't last for long when Shun suddenly looked up to the ceiling alertly. "There's a party approaching, around two hundred metres away … six, concealed so well that I couldn't sense them before." Shun paused for a second as horror dawned on his face. "They are heading straight for Naka Shrine." _Well, so much for getting out of here without anyone seeing this. I seriously doubt that they are here for the tourism._

"Why the hell …" _Hang on, the demolition of Naka Shrine was buried for so long, what a coincidence that Shun had managed to find it before the actual demolition date._

This was a trap all along. Danzō had never planned to just frame me. He wanted me dead with a dirty reputation.

Back in my past life in OLYMPUS, one of my first assignment as 'Artemis' was to kill a high government official who had been promoting the passing of a clause that would seriously impede OLYMPUS' operation. Under Heracles's watchful evaluation, I had assassinated the target and framed the murder as him being killed by a drug trafficker while he had been receiving bribes. The man was squeaky clean, yet with a few vague clues implemented, which were designed to be found by a small analyst in the investigation bureau, I turned him into a man who was killed because he was corrupted. The investigation was hushed quickly because of the possible scandal, and the untold story would be forever buried along with the official's corpse.

After all, once someone was dead, all the stories were free to be manipulated with little chance of clarification. A dead girl like me with no clan to back her up, no one would have the power nor motivation to avenge me. Besides, an Anbu Captain stealing classified reports that could start the next great war? Scandalous, it would be much better to keep it under control.

"They are here to kill me, Shun, they've ―"

"Planted the perfect evidence to get a legitimate excuse for your death. Yeah, kind of figured that part out when you said you were being framed." _Oh, good, we are on the same page_ , I thought as Shun asked again, "Who are 'they'?"

"It's best if you don't know right now … In fact, can you disperse yourself so that you can inform the Hokage?" I asked. Honestly, the Hokage might not believe me, but it would definitely look better if he could be informed of the possibility that I was innocent before Danzō started to whisper in his ears.

 _Wait a second, if Danzō orchestrated for Shun to show me this information, then how did he plan to keep him quiet?_

Shun was different from me. He came from a squeaky clean family with no missing-nin brother, his clan was actually a functional clan with recognition, and his shishou was none other than the Yamanaka Clan head who actually had some say in the village. Unlike my case, Shun couldn't just be written off by a half-assed story, so how else would Danzō ensure Shun's discretion …

 _Oh. OH. Shun's role is the low-level analyst from the investigation bureau._

 _With Shun bringing me the information, it was almost guaranteed by our history that he would come with me - we are all stubborn as hell. Besides, I was the one who proposed the shadow clone, which would be easy to pop with a simple excuse of me needing a storage scroll. In that case, I would most likely need to show him the underground basement in order to send him away with the excuse of packing up the bookshelf or the stones or whatever. That way, even if the underground basement was discovered tomorrow, I would have a perfect alibi using Shun in showing that whatever's here is perfectly innocent as I hid away the illegal evidence while he was gone._

I just found a loophole in my own alibi, because this was what I did back in OLYMPUS: Assassinating targets and frame them on someone else. I made up stories from fragmented pieces of information and discreetly suggested them from the shadows. If I could make it up in a few seconds, then I was sure that Danzō already had a few written down.

Shun wouldn't testify against me, but he would have no choice. With our emotional ties, anything he tries to say in my defense would be regarded as invalid. Looking back, he was the only one who knew that I had actively sought out Naka Shrine because I had asked him to find the location for me. He himself even stated that I was acting strange today - agitated, paranoid, rushing to the shrine without consulting the Hokage - and the piece of news that had tipped me off (at least according to him) was the demolition of Naka Shrine. This could be regarded differently in several ways, but when you had a narrator leading the strings, it was easy to fall onto one conclusion.

I had never really given him a reason to trust my innocence other than our friendship and he couldn't deny the fact that he saw a Sharingan-based seal. If all of the above failed, there was still that stupidly dangerous mind control thing that Danzō had used on me. Look at how it had influenced my perception of people! With some appropriate suggestions, all of these vague and indirect facts could steer the conclusion to one particular end: I deserved to die for the crime of treason.

"Shun, when your memories return, act like nothing has happened. They probably put a surveillance on you to make sure that they can control your side of the information. If you can find Inoichi-san, inform him first …" I ranted on and on as I ran my hands over the rest of the shelf. The rest of the scrolls were all old and untouched. Compared to this shelf of ancient history, the one in my hand was sticking out like a sore thumb.

I checked the shelf for any other possible incriminating pieces of evidence, but then I realised that Shun wasn't answering me. Hesitantly, I asked again, "What's wrong?" _Do you not believe me? Are you still in shock? Are you still breathing...!_

 _Ah, damn it, I'm panicking as well._

"I can't disperse." _What?_ "I'm not the shadow clone. The shadow clone is in the Intelligence Division right now, I'm the original body." I stared at the man in front of me with disbelief. There was a moment of dreading silence before ―

"Are you serious!" I yelled, "Which part of 'send a shadow clone' did you not understand?" I turned around and let out a groan of frustration.

"What did you expect me to do? You can't sense your own chakra, but to me, it's very obvious that something's wrong. When I look at you, I see an ocean current that just can't be calmed. You've kept your Sharingan on for the whole time ever since I met you tonight. It's like you're afraid to turn it off, even for a second." Ah, we were way too familiar with each other - and way too stubborn as well.

"Whatever you're thinking, hurry up, they are only a hundred meters away." Shun reminded me grimly as I bit my lower lip in irritation. I wished that I could send some electricity into my brain to make the nerve impulses fire faster.

 _Not a shadow clone, not a shadow clone … Danzō would never let a real corporeal body come near here. Shun's designated role may be the analyst, but it would have been a different story if he were the witness. Shadow clones can be easily disintegrated - just a stray kunai will do; hell, Root doesn't even have to do it, I could disperse Shun's clone myself - but a real body will witness the entire murder. And we can't have that since I'm supposed to be killed in the name of self-defense because they didn't have any other choice. So that means …_

"They also don't know that you are not just a mere shadow clone." After a second of unbearable silence, I spoke up. "They will be expecting you to disperse, so while I'm stalling them, you are taking the scroll back to the Hokage."

A shadow clone might be considered more advantageous in this situation, but a real body had its own uses. First of all, it could actually transport the scroll without the chance of dispersing and leaving the evidence behind (first rule of infiltration: let the shadow clone do the scouting, but _never_ let the shadow clone transport any important items alone). Moreover, Shun could dictate where he would go. He could escape the surveillance near his workplace and go somewhere, or find someone else. In the rare but possible circumstance where Danzō decides it's better to just kill off Shun, he would at least have a chance to escape.

Quickly, I pulled out one of the older scrolls that were similar in size and colour to the scroll containing the Anbu evidence. When I pulled it open to examine the content, the word "Susanoo" popped out immediately. By the trend I was seeing with naming Mangekyou Sharingan's abilities with the names of Gods, I would say that this scroll contained some jutsu relating to the Mangekyou. _I had been hoping for some useless family pedigree chart, but this will have to do._

"Pull out the scroll spine, and switch this on." Shun pushed down his protests when I sent him a determined glare. Quickly, the shiny metallic spine on the fake scroll was replaced by the worn out wooden spine on my family's scroll. After rolling the fake scroll on the dusty ground for a few seconds, it looked just as old as any other scroll here.

"How in the world do you plan on convincing them to let me go?" Shun asked worriedly. "They will be alerted of your Sharingan and you won't have a chance to put a genjutsu on all six of them."

"Shun, at this point, if I still have to rely on the Sharingan to be able to cast any genjutsu, then I might as well just resign from Anbu," I said while fastening the Uchiha scroll onto my belt and handed the Anbu scroll to Shun who immediately hid it in his jacket.

"How far are they now?" I asked before pricking my thumb with a kunai.

"sixty metres." Without any more hesitation, I pressed my thumb onto the dusty floor until the familiar circle of ink appeared.

"You are early this time, Maiko-chan. How may I be of your service?" Fuyuki said as she tried to shake the dust off of her body.

"Right now, this is a pretty intense situation in which I am being framed by a nasty person. So would you please escort Shun here back to the Hokage's office with the incriminating evidence so that my name can be cleared?" _Yep, that seemed like a good summary,_ I thought proudly, but Fuyuki still gave me a confused look.

"Shun will tell you the rest, I need your Deep Earth Travelling technique to hide Shun's presence and to travel as fast as you can." Fuyuki's proficiency in earth release was gained through decades of training in the unforgiving realm of ice and snow, where the actual earth was buried metres down below the solid ice. Travelling deep into the soft earth of Konoha was child's play for her, even when she had to take one person (who was usually me). With them deep underground and my genjutsu, I just might actually be able to fool any sensors.

Genjutsu, right, I need to prepare for a strong genjutsu. Without wasting any time, I pulled out a roll of wire from the pouch and tied it to the hilt of my tantō. Letting the sword hang from my wrist, I made four hand seals in a blur of motion before grabbing the hilt. Immediately, the silver glow radiated brightly as it had many times before, nothing unusual.

"Twenty metres." Shun's chilling reminder snapped my attention back to the entrance above our heads.

"Is there any chance that they are just scouts for the demolition?" _How hopeful and optimistic,_ I thought silently in response to Shun's suggestion. Not that I could blame him, poor Shun, so confused, and I wasn't any better.

"Five hours before the demolition in the dead of night? How diligent of them." With soundless steps, I walked up the staircase.

"Fuyuki, can you travel from the basement?" I asked the wolf as she placed her paw gently on the stone floor.

"Sorry, the stone ground only extends for a few metres beneath. Whoever built this war chamber quarantined this area with metal. Impressive, I must say." Well, at least some Uchiha ancestor could be happy about the compliment in the afterlife. As for the current living ones, not so much.

"Okay then, hide within the earth as best as you can and wait for your chance." With a sigh, I ordered. Fuyuki's mastery with earth release allowed the whole ground to be her hiding place, so with a nod, she sank down under the stone floor and I soon lost track of her signature.

Just above us, I could hear the six sets of footsteps entering the creaking temple with caution. _This is it, I'm at the end of my road. I've prepared for all I can. And now, I only have two goals: guide Shun away and stay alive._

If you really thought about it, the story that Danzō made was pretty half-assed. So many plot holes, so many speculations, so many uncharacteristic events. But it would work, as long as one condition is fulfilled.

I would have to be dead. It mattered not if I had died with a tainted reputation or an innocent status. As long as my death occurs, it would be all over.

"I promise that I will get this back to Hokage-sama." I heard Shun's whisper behind me as I opened the stone entrance with the Root agents probably waiting in anticipation. "Just please don't kill any of them. If you kill anyone from the village who's not declared a missing-nin, no matter how legitimate your excuse is, you will forever be in the dark part of history."

 _I know that! Do you think that I can't feel the pairs of eyes scrutinizing me ever since I joined Anbu? And they've only increased since my promotion. Judging me with caution, waiting for a mistake, any mistake, and making sure that I don't turn out like Itachi. Why do you think Danzō made such a brazen move? It's because he can afford to. But I can't! I have no room for mistakes._

"I'll try." That was all I could answer before I spied the six figures standing a few metres away from the sliding stone, spread out against the front wall and blocking the large entrance to the shrine. Anbu masks, black cloaks, but all of them have a tipless tanto pulled out in front of them in an offensive position, separating them from the normal Anbu unit with the standardised twenty-five-inch long chokutō.

 _Doesn't anyone know that you just don't give black-ops members uniforms or any identifying traits that will connect them back to a single organisation?_ Sometimes, I felt the need to judge this world's definition of what a black-op organisation was, with the theme of animal masks and tattoos and all. With the hatred put aside, OLYMPUS was definitely more pro than Anbu or even Root in this department.

My eyes ran over them, irides still bleeding red. They lowered their heads a bit to avoid my eye level. Even with the shadow from the masks, I could tell that they were staring at my hands instead - a standard counter when facing a dōjutsu user.

 _Go on,_ I wanted to yell out as my right hand tightened around the silvery tantō with the wire attached. _Say your piece, let's see the story that you've spun to tell and get it over with._ And if they were brave enough, they would say it while looking at me straight in the eye.

Despite all the confusion and uncertainty I was feeling, my goal couldn't be any clearer at the moment.

Stay alive, because only a living person has the voice to speak the truth.

* * *

A/N: So, keep in mind that our protagonist is an unreliable narrator to a large extent. She's trying to figure things out using limited information, and she used her past experience as a template, so a lot of her deduction may or may not be what was really planned by Danzo. She might be overestimating his bullshit skill, or underestimating how far he's willing to go, who knows. Also, there will be some instances where Maiko will attribute many events to Danzo when in fact there are other parties at play. For example, who really was the person that retracted the notification for Naka Shrine's demolition and for what reason?

So, again, the update schedule is floating in the wind somewhere, another two weeks, perhaps? Well at least, it's not 'gone with the wind' (sorry for the pun, I'll let myself out).


	38. Chapter 38 - Pandora's Box

A/N: I'm sorry! for disappearing off of the face of the Earth for five weeks. I thought I could post a chapter in between my exams, but then I realised that I actually need to study a lot more ... My month-long exams just ended this Friday, I was going to update on Saturday, but then I sleep through Saturday like a rock ... Post-exam crash, I swear ... Anyway, the update will return to normal now that my exams are over, and here are 13k words for all you amazing people.

Beta'd by Alice J

* * *

Chapter 38 - Pandora's Box

"To what do I owe the honour of this visit, for the lot of you to appear in my family shrine in the dead of the night?" To be fair, I already knew the answer to that question. However, they didn't have to know that.

Patience. Patience was key. Right now, I couldn't make a rash mistake such as attacking first. So whatever violence they had planned, they would have to instigate it themselves.

"Uchiha Maiko, you are under arrest for the investigation of a possible breach of Anbu security," one of the Root agents said, albeit a bit unwillingly. With Shun still standing halfway up the stairs, just tall enough to peek up the floor and observe the whole scene, I bravely took a step forward. Immediately, the Root agents' tantō glistened as they shifted uncomfortably.

"Really? On what grounds do you suspect me?" I asked with feigned nonchalance. _Go on, let's hear how good your story is._

"A suspicious figure had been sighted entering and exiting the Archive room for Anbu documents multiple times without reporting and only Anbu captains have access to the code without triggering an alarm." As the speaker recited the lines that were clearly pre-choreographed, I digested the information silently.

"So? There are dozens of Anbu captains, have all of them been arrested for the investigation?"

"The incidence of sighting matches the dates that you were not on missions; most of the other captains all have officially issued missions as alibis." Upon hearing the well-crafted story, I frowned. Exactly how long have they been spying on me in order to get the detailed schedule of all my missions?

"You know that you can't arrest someone with the rank of an Anbu captain without the Hokage's warrant. Show me the warrant." I pressed on immediately. Being an Anbu captain did have its perks. For example, I had access to the code that allowed one to pass the village barrier without being detected and I also had more access to files than most Jōnin in the village. Of course, most of those advantages would probably be used against me in this situation, but the one thing they couldn't manipulate was the fact that only the Hokage could decide my fate. Him and no one else, not even Danzō.

"The warrant is only necessary for an execution order. This is but a preliminary order for investigation, so drop your weapons and come with us and no harm will come to you." _You sure about that? Because you are pointing six swords at me right now._ Truly, I was amazed at their abilities to lie so blatantly. But then again, we couldn't exactly survive without this certain skillset.

"Come back with a warrant, and then I'll come with you." I said to the six of them before I added helpfully, "If you're worried that I might run away, Shun here can keep an eye on me. He's not on your investigation list, is he?"

I could see their gazes shift between Shun's supposed shadow clone and my weapons, unsure of what to do. I guessed that they weren't really prepared for a situation where I had not dispersed Shun's clone already.

"Yamanaka Shun is not a suspect in the investigation, but now that he's seen with you, he will be dealt with as a witness if the need arises in your investigation. In the meantime, he may remove himself from the scene and wait to be summoned." _Now that wasn't very subtle, was it,_ I mocked silently. It seemed that their improvisation skill could only go so far. I could hear their wishes for Shun's shadow clone to disappear oozing out of their voice. But no, I wasn't going to disperse him, not until they pushed me to.

"Fine, then some of you may stay to watch me while the others go run along and get that warrant along with some actual Anbu agents. Six, really, you flatter me." I was pushing their buttons and I knew it. At this point, if I attacked first, then I might win the battle, but I would lose the war.

"Stop playing games and come with us. Your arrest is not negotiable. If you don't come with us willingly, then we would have no choice but to take you by force." One of them - a different one this time - growled in a harsher tone. His eyes flickered to Shun behind me, probably thinking of a way for a stray kunai to hit him accidentally so that he wouldn't witness the real reason why they were here. So immediately, I took a few steps forward and positioned myself further away from the basement entrance, directly between the party of intruders and my friend.

 _Yep, Danzō would definitely rather kill me than see me in jail._ _But why? If we are only talking about me rejecting his offer, I sincerely doubt that it was enough of a reason to kill me, especially since he seemed very successful in keeping his operation alive despite having someone like Kakashi knowing about it. He is not brash and reckless like the Snow Daimyo. Unless I was stepping on something else that's dangerous for him?_

"Oh, I'm willing to cooperate, but the problem is that your accusation doesn't seem very legitimate, and neither do you." They were definitely unnerved by my sudden move. Just like that, agitation spread like a wildfire as their previously motionless bodies repositioned themselves quickly in preparation for the impending attacks.

"Then, we have no choice but to apprehend you by force." As soon as the last word dropped, three of them charged towards me with flashing blades as the other three stayed behind and guarded the entrance with alertness. A good choice. They were showing me that there was no way to escape and forcing us to disperse the shadow clone under the façade that it was our only way of communication to the outside.

 _Just a little longer, Shun, and then the genjutsu will activate._ The moment they rushed forward, crackling lightning engulfed my left hand.

Meanwhile, two blades sailed over my head as I ducked swiftly. Raising my own tantō that was still glowing silver, I flicked the two blades together and pushed them in the direction of the third sword in front of me.

The blades never crashed together because the momentum was resolved neatly in the air as the blades narrowly avoided each other. Locking on that moment when their attention was focused on one another, I pressed the electricity charged palm onto the stone floor for a Lightning Release: Electrifying Web.

I was being nice since I didn't add Chidori to that, but still, five electrical surges fanned out with me as a centre point. Two jagged surges of icy blue aimed for two of the Root agents in front of me, pushing them back towards the front entrance, while the other three bypassed them and headed straight for the three guarding the door, lighting up the entire shrine.

As soon as the tingling electricity left my hand, I turned my attention back to the one that I had deliberately left out of the earlier attack. The man took a step back to avoid the centre of surging electricity as he twirled his sword into a reverse grip and stabbed down mercilessly.

He was fast, perhaps well enough to be an Anbu agent, but not fast enough. Honestly, I did not become an Anbu captain just because I had a sob history and a maniac of a brother. Before his blade even came close to my head, I flicked it up above and slithered into that distance between his sword arm and his torso.

Metallic sparks flew above my head as I kneed him sharply in the kidney. The strong force caused him to double over without even realising what the hell was going on. Suddenly, I felt a piercing force coming from behind me as his sword grip was once again adjusted to stab me in the back.

Ducking once more, I escaped from the front and appeared to his left. Upon realising that his target was gone, he had just enough control to stop his blade from piercing his own flesh. But then, my left hand gripped onto the back of his neck from the side, letting a stream of electricity down his spine.

 _There, that should stop his nerves from working for a long while, if I haven't already fried his spinal cord._ Oh, he was going to fall quickly because of the paralysis, but I couldn't just let him sleep here. Reaching out with my tantō, I easily disarmed him and flicked the weapon to the side now that there was absolutely no resistance on his part. Of course, I didn't forget to flash the silver sword in front of his face casually as part of the disarming motion before I sent him to join his brethren on the front wall with a chakra enhanced kick.

As soon as the first one crashed into the wall, the rest got free of the troublesome web of paralysing lightning, mostly injury-free. When they were about to charge again as they attempted to surround me in a semi-circle, I knew that this was the time.

So against everything Akira-shishou had told me, I threw the tantō like a shuriken. The blade fired away like a rocket, but I managed to catch onto the slipping wire attached to its hilt before it could leave my hand. Like a whip, I swung the blade in front of me in a wide arc.

Apparently, my move was quite surprising because hello, why would I throw the sword when I have plenty of _actual_ projectile weapons. But still, as the blade passed by, every one of the Root agents halted in their steps to avoid gaining a new unaesthetic scar on their faces.

The airy cloud of silver passed by their faces one by one until the Root agent at the far left finally gathered up the courage and blocked the weapon in its trajectory. The metals clashed in front of his face and before he could confiscate my weapon, I reeled the wire backwards and let the tantō hit the ground at my feet. The silver glow had faded as soon as it hit the stone cold floor, but it didn't matter now.

 _Done, genjutsu activated, all six of them._ From now on until one of them managed to break out of it - which wouldn't be anytime soon seeing that all six of them were affected at once and I poured out so much yin-chakra into it - their sense perception and point of focus would be under my control.

So now, I just needed to get Shun and myself a chance to get out of the shrine.

As hands were clapped together, a series of seals were formed fluidly. A powerful gust of wind slashed through the air, crashing the five that were still standing into the flimsy wall. Not wasting a moment, I whistled lightly. Turning my head slightly to the back, I pointed at the giant hole at the back of the shrine that was caused by the fallen tree.

One second later, Shun flickered to the hole. Two seconds later, Fuyuki appeared out of the basement. She gave me a slight nod before following Shun out of the shrine and together, they disappeared out of the sight. Once Fuyuki was twenty metres below ground, not many people could find her, not even most sensors. Of course, Byakugan users excluded.

The process would probably take around eight seconds, so currently, I was doing the exhausting job of supplying every one of the Root agents a different scenario than the one that had just happened.

The crash from the wind release earlier was mostly for my sake as people's perception was most hazy when they were regaining their footings. Therefore, I would be able to get away with supplying fewer details. I sincerely believed that one of the most useful qualities of Sharingan was its keen sense of observation. Just one look at the shrine and I was able to get most details down - the arrangement of the floor tilings, the spatial orientation from all angles … With that, I was able to recreate the vivid image of what they would see while they were recovering, just without any perception of Shun and Fuyuki.

To put it plainly, it was photoshop at its finest.

However, other than just removing the two variables, I added two very important details as the points of focus. One, the slight poof of smoke originating from a shadow clone popping, barely visible above the ground level; two, the flash of the scroll that contained all the incriminating evidence on my waist as I hastily ran past them out of the shrine.

People have selective attention, and therefore, it wouldn't be a surprise if certain details popped out to them as I redirected their point of focus. Although not counting the one currently unconscious, only three Root agents got a hint of those two details. After all, not everyone could see the same thing.

 _Come on! Come after me!_ I prayed as I rushed out of the front entrance, not forgetting to pick up the tantō in the process. I just needed to keep the genjutsu activated for ten seconds before slowly relinquishing the control and letting their perception return to normal.

Soon enough, I heard five sets of rushed footsteps following quickly from behind. _Good, I got all of their attention, more lethal weapons for me._ Straight away, two strings of kunai shot past my head and made a sharp turn in front of me before I could blink. One of them shot to the left and the other one, right. The two strings of ninja wire made a loop in front of me that threatened to take off my head if I hadn't ducked at the last moment.

I slid under the wires and drew my swords up hastily to block yet more incoming kunai and shuriken, tilting them slightly so that they punctured the nearly trees instead of me. When I raised my head again, I saw a shadow flutter swiftly above my head.

 _Messenger hawk,_ I recognised immediately, so without a second thought, a kunai shot out of my hand. If that hawk wasn't used to call more backup, then it was used to inform their friends who were probably spying on the intelligence division. Either way, I couldn't allow it to fly away.

Before my kunai could pierce through the bird, it was slapped to the side by an incoming shuriken. Cursing silently, I jumped up to the tree branches in order to avoid that seemingly inexhaustive supply of projectile weapons aiming for my back.

The bird was flying about a dozen metres in front of me, so I tried again, flicking two kunai from my fingers straight at the hawk. They were both deflected immediately like I had predicted. It was kind of embarrassing that as an Uchiha, my bukijutsu wasn't as good as it was supposed to be. However, this time, I didn't bother to retract my extended arm. At the same moment as when the metals hit each other in mid-air, a single senbon of a dim, icy blue colour shot out of my fingertip.

It pierced past the projectiles weapons and went through the bird. A second later, the poor hawk fell silently and disappeared somewhere into the treeline. That was a technique I had used to practice lightning chakra control; it might not be enough to kill a human, but it was definitely enough to immobilise a bird.

The moment my senbon hit its target, the branch that I had landed on cracked with an unpleasant sound and I was forced to jump down from the tree. Suddenly, an earth spike rose from the point of my prepared landing, aiming to impale me before I could change my momentum.

At the last possible moment, I threw the tantō and it hit a nearby branch. The wire brought my fall to an abrupt halt before I swung over the array of earth spikes and landed in the clump of bushes on the right. I only had enough time to retract my tantō, which apparently was a really nice whip, before I had to keep on running endlessly.

The next ten minutes consisted of a lot of run-and-chase as I ran in a zigzag formation around the terrain full of obstacles. Shurikens and kunais rained down on me like a tsunami, followed by a stupid and endless amount of earth spikes rising under my each and every step.

Soon, I realised my first immediate problem other than the fact that I was being hunted: their teamwork was amazing. Seriously, it was as if they always knew where I could go despite my irregular course, and some of them would always appear in front of me, pushing me off my planned route and driving me back towards the village border. At this rate, I would never get back to the village. In fact, before I had known it, I was back at the shrine again, with its decaying wooden structure staring back at me mockingly.

 _Ah, damn it, they must have a damn good sensor on their side, along with some way to contact each other within moment's notice._ If I wanted to get back, I would need to shave off some pursuers.

I flipped down to the ground when for the millionth time, two Root agents blocked my way and forced me to go another direction. They were hot on my trail now, with one of them immediately behind me and another disappearing in another direction, probably attempting a formation to try and close in on me.

After a moment of thought and making sure that the two of them were far enough from each other, I suddenly bent down and touched the ground right after forming three hand seals. Without delay, a two-metre earth wall rose behind me.

In all honestly, Earth Release was my worst element, because its concrete nature in order to gain the defensive power was everything that my shapeless fire nature was not. However, having Fuyuki as my companion had taught me that Earth Release has more than a simple defence purpose.

Hearing the footsteps arriving right behind the earth wall, I jumped a huge step forward before putting my hand on the ground again. This time, the earth fluidly swallowed me as I sunk down. Compared to Fuyuki's Deep Earth Travelling technique, mine was, using her words, a pup's practice exercise. However, it did allow me to hide my presence for a little while before the earth turned into my prison instead.

A light thud sounded above me, signifying that my pursuer had jumped over the earth wall. Catching that moment, I broke through the earth and gathered a large amount of wide lightning at my palm at the last second before surfacing.

I grabbed the Root agent's ankle and sent the lightning down his leg mercilessly. Soon, I started to smell charred tissue along with some screaming. When I was fully out of the earth, the agent had already dropped to the ground, unable to stand again. _If that leg heals in less than a week, I'm going to be pissed._

I was totally going to start running again, now that the original party of six was reduced to four. But before I had the chance to me, the creepy feeling of being locked on by someone sent a chill down my body, because _someone_ else was clearly trying to invade my mind.

 _Yamanaka's secret techniques,_ I cursed silently, just how far did Danzō's web reach? I didn't have that mental block of yin-chakra anymore to boot him out, but I did have something horrifying called the Mangekyou Sharingan. _You really don't want to see my mind, because even Shun agrees that some minds should just be left alone._ As the alternate consciousness tried to wrap around me, I blinked into the Mangekyou. The struggle for mind lasted for less than a second before that consciousness retreated.

Unfortunately for me, since I was being pursued by Root, a second was all they needed to catch up to my faltered steps. The moment my consciousness was clear again, I saw a blade aiming for my head.

 _Clank!_ The two tantō clashed forcefully as I stopped the blade from advancing into my brain. The man in front of me, who wore a mask resembling a gorilla, immediately tried to grab onto my exposed arm. The instant I saw his abnormal purple skin colour, I instinctively stepped back and missed his swing by just a few centimetres. That purple skin, I had no idea what it was, but like hell I would let it touch me.

The moment I drew back from the gorilla masked man, all the other Root agents surrounded me in a square formation. Blades were drawn and breaths were halted; a few moments where our movements halted indefinitely. Suddenly, I bent my legs sharply in preparation for a jump, but the attempted jump never came because I whipped my head back instead, locking eyes with the unprepared masked agent behind me. Immediately, he tried to put up an earth wall to block my sight. _Smart decision, not closing his eyes to giving me any room for an attack… if only you were faster._

The earth wall stopped rising as the man fell unconscious onto the ground. Before any of the other Root agents could react, I jumped onto the half-formed earth wall. The elevation cleared the path in front of me and I used it as a platform for a long distance body flicker.

I appeared over a dozen metres away from my original position when they finally realised what the hell had happened. Despite my shortened breaths, I ran as fast as I could towards the line where the rocky forest terrain would end. _Just a few more minutes, and then they can't hide behind the mask of anonymity anymore._

What wishful thinking. My mind couldn't help but go back to Kakashi's ninken training sessions where I would always get ambushed at the last moment. I was so close to getting out when a cloud of purple poisonous _something_ erupted behind me.

I ducked awkwardly so that this disgusting purple paint wouldn't touch me, and it definitely didn't help that the Yamanaka mind controller decided to strike at this time. Ignoring the pain on my body when the jagged rocks stabbed me, I could only give the last push to roll out of the forest and onto the open dirt field of training ground 25 before my mind seemed to freeze in shock.

 _He learned from last time, instead of a mind-body switch, he used the disturbance so that he wouldn't have to face my mind._ I didn't know why I was complimenting him because clearly, I was surrounded by the three remaining Root agents once again.

 _I can't believe I am being hunted in my own damn village, now that's another level of screwed up on my top three list._

The disturbance only lasted for a few seconds, but when it finally cleared up after my constant resistance, three glistening blades attacked from various directions, threatening to trisect my body.

 _I gave you a way out, so stop pushing me!_ I could just feel the anger rising in my chest when I pulled out the ninjatō from its sheath as wild electricity sizzled through the twin blades. With a clean but abrupt swipe, I deflected one blade that was aiming for my chest and let the lightning travel along the blade and into the Root agent's sword arm, before flipping almost horizontally in mid-air between the blades that were aiming for my neck and thigh respectively.

Once I landed on the ground again, I lowered my body and swung the blades in a circle. Two of them had enough speed to jump backwards at the last moment, but the one who had the luck to be the first one standing in my ninjatō's path got sliced in the left ankle.

Quickly, before the Root agents could close in on me again, I gathered chakra in my legs and applied a body flicker right towards the agent who was trying really hard to keep his balance with one injured leg. _This better not be the Yamanaka who might be Shun's first cousin, because it's getting really hard to get them off my case without killing them._

Cursing my own bleeding heart, I twirled the sword around in my hand and slammed the hilt into his ribcage. Due to the sudden acceleration from the body flicker, the agent was flung backwards a few metres by the force while his chest made a small cracking noise.

Before I had the chance to put this one under a genjutsu, I experienced that dreadful feeling of being possessed again, but this time, I knew exactly where it was coming from. I whipped my head to the right and glared at the man who was currently making a Yamanaka hand seal right at my head. Immediately, his attempt at mind transfer was halted when he lowered his eyes and moved his hands to reach for a weapon.

 _Hey, it's rude to not look someone in the eye._ Our blades slammed together between our bodies, but instead of the sound of crackling lightning, it was the soft glow of the silver yin-chakra that greeted the Yamanaka.

Genjutsu required a medium to carry the yin-chakra close to the target in order to influence their chakra system. Eyes, sound, even air were all mediums for delivering a genjutsu, but they differ in their capacity to carry yin-chakra. Sharingan, being part of an Uchiha's natural chakra system, had the greatest advantage in casting genjutsu whereas air, being spread out and thin, required the most effort in casting a genjutsu.

When the shade of silver reflected on his mask, the Yamanaka's movement was only frozen for less than a split second as a small wave of vertigo hit. Catching that precious moment, I sliced my other sword upwards. It made a clean mark across his mask before it broke in half and fell down, revealing a head of orange hair and a young face that perhaps had a fifty percent similarity to Shun when he was my age.

I was contemplating how to best incapacitate him without giving him significant damage since given my experience, sensors and medic-nins had to be the first ones to be put down and this applied especially well when it was a Yamanaka plotting against you.

A genjutsu was ready to fire from my eyes, but my opponent swiftly moved his body to the side, resembling the motion of falling, therefore moving out of my vision diagonally. My eyes trailed after his face, trying to catch him in another more permanent genjutsu. Suddenly, in my peripheral vision, a glistening blade appeared where the Yamanaka's head had once obstructed my vision.

I didn't have enough focus to dwell on how well-timed that attack was. With a sidestep at the last moment, I had barely managed to avoid that precise strike as it scraped past my ear, leaving a small nick.

"Stop!" _Come on! Not now._ Before I could perform a counterstrike, I heard a very familiar voice yelling at us. The problem was, my attack was halted by the yell because I knew him, but my enemies clearly didn't care. _Seriously Kakashi? Pick a better time because unlike me, they are not used to listening to your commands._

A hand clawed onto my left ankle, holding me in place as the two people in front of me raised their swords to try to impale me again. Without even looking down, I knew it was that guy I disarmed earlier but didn't quite manage to paralyse.

I could just feel the emotions bubbling in my chest again; a sense of unfairness, anger all mixed together. Chakra flowed down for enhancement, my right foot stomped on the ground, and my body was bent backwards. The backflip was so abrupt and forceful that it broke through the tight grip on my left ankle as my legs whipped through the air and managed to kick back their blades and stopped their advancement.

My right foot landed first, but when my left foot landed, I was immediately forced into a kneeling position as I brought my swords up before the two tantōs could decapitate my head.

"I can walk by myself for an audience with Hokage-sama, thank you very much." I squeezed the words out of my mouth very carefully as the slightest movement could result in a shift of position between our weapons, not that the positions were very favourable in the first place - one was halted above my head and the other, barely blocked next to my neck.

"Retract your swords. Her rank doesn't allow you to execute her on the spot." Kakashi flickered beside me and said in a voice full of authority. Still, their swords didn't move.

"Hatake Kakashi, mind your own business. She attacked and tried to run away with classified Anbu information, I am only executing the order that says to eliminate threats to the village." Suddenly, I felt very humiliated at being called a traitor by someone who had obviously set me up for this farce.

 _Excuse me? I was the one who tried her hardest to_ return _to the village centre while the lot of you were playing tag to drive me out._

"Any of her alleged crimes will be judged by Hokage-sama directly." _Yeah, I tried that. Come on, Kakashi, you can do better._ "Luckily, I have a summoning order issued directly by the Hokage - even signed with chakra signature - to bring her in for some questioning, alive." With that being said, Kakashi promptly pulled out a very nice-looking scroll and flashed it in front of the Root agents' faces (the ones still standing anyway). I had no idea how he got it within such short notice, but it did seem very legitimate.

"You may come with me to present the evidence and oversee the process if you so wish, but it's not your place to kill her." At this point, it was pretty clear to the Root agents in front of me that the secret assassination had failed. So after what felt like an eternity, the pressure on my blades finally disappeared.

"Now put the swords back." Nobody moved. "All of you."

That hint of impatience in his voice prompted me to take a step back and placed my swords back into their respective sheaths. All this time, my gaze never left the two, now three - since one of them had finally crawled up from the ground with his hands were still twitching - enemies in front of me.

Immediately, Kakashi confiscated my belt as a whole, not even bothering to pick off individual things. The swords, the scroll … everything was taken away from me. Now that I actually had a chance to look at the scroll, I realised that it was fully covered in mud, dirt, and occasionally, grass, like a pottery casing enclosing whatever it was inside.

"We're heading to the Hokage's tower. Leave or follow us, your choice." Just like that, he pushed me forward and ushered to walk first, before following me a step or two behind. A few seconds later, a cluster of footsteps sounded behind him, signalling that the agents had decided to follow him.

"Wait." One of them suddenly called out - a young but calm voice. Against Kakashi's irritated gaze, the Root agent quickly fished out a pair of ugly and chunky handcuff and held it to us. "As per the standard procedure that applies to all missions, if the target for questioning has shown a previous tendency to struggle and a chance of violence, sealing their chakra is the protocol upon apprehension."

 _Oh, come on! That's only for …_ For a second, I found myself unable to find a proper excuse to fight that. A previous tendency for violence? Check. It didn't matter who started it and what reason it was for, the forest still contained evidence for an in-village fight. The arrival of an official order from the Hokage granted me official immunity from any harm not ordered by him, but it also implied my position as a 'target for questioning'. It was a weird place, the one I was stuck in. Not classified as a criminal, but also not quite in league with the trusted good guys either.

 _But still, that's so unfair._ I took a step forward with agitation, totally ready to argue for my justice. But before I could do that, a hand clapped on my shoulder and pulled me back harshly.

"Behave, you're still under investigation." With that, plus a cold glare, my anger was partially deflated. Kakashi was right, he was making sure that everything he was involved in followed standard procedures - even dangling that supposedly incriminating scroll in plain sight for scrutinising, with no intention of hiding it - so that no fault can be picked from it. I needed to do my part as well.

Obediently, I held out my hands in front of me. With one more critical look at the obsidian metal, Kakashi took it from the Root agent's hand and clasped it on my wrists.

The metal clicked together as the chill seeped in from the cold surface. Just like that, something important, a spark perhaps, was gone inside my body.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

I could have sworn, most of the time, my fear had to do with losing something. But at this moment, I was feeling more angry than afraid.

Yes, they left me in a cell, with chakra-restraining devices wrapped around my wrists. I couldn't generate any chakra flow, and this emptiness in my body was making me afraid of losing something. No, the cell was not well lit, in fact, this darkness was making me think as if there were some kind of monster hiding in the shadow, waiting to devour me at my weakest moment.

 _Ridiculous, now I'm fantasising fairy tales, so get your―_ I did not get to finish that thought since a sharp pain in my skull forced me to shut my eyes tight in the effort of trying to dull the sting. I had no idea why my head was hurting of all places since I didn't remember hitting my head during the earlier fight.

Kakashi said that I would be questioned by the Hokage and I was definitely looking forward to that with mixed feelings. But it seemed like Danzō beat me in terms of speed - hence why I was waiting in a temporary cell in the tower - and who knew what kind of lies he was feeding the Hokage-sama right now.

 _Shun, I wonder if he returned safely._ I lost my connection with Fuyuki when my chakra was sealed, and most likely, she was already gone because of the lack of chakra to supply her existence in this dimension.

Just as I was trying to conjure up a mental map of Konoha and calculate the time Shun needed for travelling, I heard the creaking sound of the cell door being pushed open. _So after leaving me here for Kami knows how long, he finally decided to give me a status update._

"I thought you were afraid." _That's not the best way to open a conversation in a cell,_ I criticised silently as the man walked in and sat down on the bench across from me.

"I was, and I still am," I answered.

"So what the hell were you thinking? When I said to go home and rest, I didn't mean that you should go out to a shady location in the middle of the night based on some suspicious information." He sounded just a bit angry, so I dropped my gaze and avoided his.

"It's not a shady place; at least, it's not supposed to be," I voiced stubbornly. Sentimentality, I swear, they mess up everything these days. Upon hearing that, all Kakashi did was to let out a sigh and rub his temple to ease his annoyance. Suddenly, I remembered Shun and the scroll, but before I could ask, he already answered me.

"Your Yamanaka friend caught me with your wolf summon, or technically, I smelled your snow wolf. I already gave the scroll to Hokage-sama earlier when I got that summoning order. What else … right, your brother is still in the Nara compound, and he should probably stay there for a few days." Those were three questions he answered before I could even sort out how to ask them. Efficient, I guess.

I opened my mouth for the fourth question but I got interrupted before even making a sound.

"How did I get the summoning scroll so fast?" _This is what happens when you talk to smart people._ "I was debriefing him about your earlier encounter with Elder Shimura, so it wasn't hard to convince him to draw up an order on the spot to get you out of the mess first." He paused for a second, before continuing, "Hokage-sama _will_ believe your innocence, he has seen your character develop over the years, and it's not the first time Danzō has tried to pull something like this. It's just that usually, he succeeds before anyone could ask any questions." _Well, that's reassuring… no, not really._ "But your case has a lot of questions and unfortunately, some of them are not in your favour. Long story short, you should answer _exactly_ what Hokage-sama asks with full honesty, nothing more, nothing less. Do you understand?"

"Of course, it's not like I have anything to hide," I said immediately. As soon as I finished the sentence, I felt the splitting headache returning. The abrupt pain made me hiss as I tried to bring my hands up to press my skull, but the heavy metal piece just dragged my arms down.

 _Damn, it's getting worse, and a lot more frequent as well._

"What's wrong? Is it the chakra-restraining cuff?" I heard him asking as this particular bout of pain dulled quickly.

"I don't know, never had the honour of wearing one before. Is it supposed to hurt like someone is punching a needle in your skull?"

"You might feel a bit numb and heavy-headed because of the restricted chakra in your body having nowhere to go, but your body will adjust accordingly after a while. You shouldn't be feeling more than a slight numbness." He looked a bit conflicted as he eyed the metal cuffs on my wrists. Since we were still doing this the proper way, that meant he couldn't take it off without the Hokage's order, especially not in a cell - that would just be the introduction to a story of how one flees the village after being arrested.

"This is definitely not a slight numbness, so how long do I have to wait before I can take this off?" I asked, eager to direct the conversation back to the most important issue at hand.

"Not long, in fact, I came here to get you. Just a warning, _he_ will also be there, so control your anger and be careful of what to say." _Right, so far, Danzō has been playing me into his hand, and I still have no clue as to what he's truly capable of_.

Once again, he pulled me up by the shoulder and led me out of the dingy little cell. Two sets of stairs, three turns in the hallway, and seventy metres. Then, I arrived in front of Hokage-sama.

"Someone can take off her restraints, it's fine." _Kami bless you, Hokage-sama,_ I almost yelled it out loud when I heard Sandaime's words. Someone, I really didn't care who it was, released the restraints. But then, everything went haywire.

For a second, the humming voice overwhelmed me as the feeling of my head being split open returned. By far, this was the worst. I had expected the return of my chakra to be wobbly because it hadn't been flowing for a while, but it just came rushing out like a wild wave over a broken dam. They didn't leak out through my body in the form of electrical sparks - that would have been much preferred. Instead, they went straight to my eyes.

I felt like a bystander looking through the glass, acutely aware of the fact that my eyes were shifted into the Mangekyou Sharingan, skipping the transition stage entirely. Before I could stop it, a ball of black flames sprouted near the Hokage's desk.

"Close your eyes!" Vaguely, I heard someone yelling at me as a sharp blade aimed for my neck. For some reason, I decided to trust that voice and closed my eyes instead of trying to block the strike. Eventually, the black flamed was quenched, and that blade? It never even reached my neck.

"See? That girl is a danger to the village. With those eyes of hers, who knows what she is planning to do." As I desperately tried to calm my chakra and revert my eyes back to normal, I heard that spider's manipulative voice.

"Hokage-sama, the side effect of having chakra restraints on is that the wearer will have no control over chakra after it has been taken off. She doesn't have sufficient knowledge to know that, I apologise for her actions." Ah, he didn't have to do that, in fact, this was my reckless mistake and now, my position of innocence would be even harder to argue for.

Finally, after much trouble, I suppressed the chakra enough that at least my eyes returned to normal. As for any ninjutsu, it would be the best case scenario if I only blew myself up. When I opened my eyes again with uncertainty and hesitation, I saw that blade aiming for my neck reflected my own eyes, but it was stopped at the last moment by a kunai. Both of them struggled to overpower each other, one for the sake of killing me, the other, saving me.

"Please, no weapons in here. Danzō, if you will." _So the Hokage already knew that the faction of Root belongs to Danzō._ Now, this was something I couldn't understand: why let him live if one had already caught wind of his traitorous actions? It was like waiting for disasters to happen.

When the Root agent sheathed his tantō, albeit very unwillingly, I recognised him as the one who had taken my handcuffs off upon the Hokage's order, seeing that it was Root's device. By now, that handcuff was already out of the view like it had never existed before.

Eventually. The Hokage laid his eyes on me. As for what I saw in his eyes? There was a bit of everything: pity, apology, and a bit of uncertainty as well.

"Maiko, seeing that Elder Shimura has some disturbing doubts, I will be asking you some questions, and I wish that you will tell me the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth." I nodded at his words, returning my gaze to the floor, my movements so slight as if a bigger breath would destroy something else, like that desk which now had lost one of its corners.

Calmly, not paying any attention to his destroyed furniture, the Hokage immediately began the inquiry. "Why were you there in the Naka Shrine, especially at such an inconvenient time?"

"I heard the shrine was being demolished," I answered in a light voice. There was a silence from the Hokage that confirmed the fact that my family shrine was probably gone forever, whether I had chosen to protest or not. Since there was no point in dwelling on that detail, I continued with my speech. "I wanted some information about my kekkei genkai techniques since I couldn't find the information in the compound, I decided to go to my family shrine. I needed to determine some side effects with my techniques before I can use them anymore." It wasn't a lie, in fact, that probably made up of 50% of the truth.

"Side effect? Don't lie to us, some sharingan powers should just be left alone. Who knows what kind of knowledge you wished to gain, especially the ones that will harm Konoha." Ah yes, how could I forget about him, that spider who twisted everything I said. But the way he phrased the words, it seemed more intentional in purpose than just some random accusation. _It almost seems like he was referencing to history - a history that only the Hokage and he know._

"And did you find the information you were looking for?" The Hokage asked me, ignoring Danzō's interjection. I thought back to the random scroll I pulled out of the shelf, something about 'Susanoo', I nodded.

"Where did you find the scroll." I was about to ask for clarification because I took more than one scroll, then I remembered what Kakashi had told me earlier: ' _Answer exactly what he asks, no more and no less.'_

"In the basement of the Shrine, Hokage-sama. It's a place where the Sharingan was needed to enter." Upon hearing my confession, Danzō seemed very pleased. How he had entered my clan's personal vault, I had no clue.

"Then how do you suppose that the incriminating evidence got there in the first place?" _I don't know, how about we ask you?_ I really wanted to shout that at Danzō, but Hokage-sama seemed like he got it all under control, so I shut my mouth and let him continue.

"Let's not jump to conclusions. Firstly, let's take a look at the evidence you spoke of, Danzō." With that, the Hokage promptly opened his drawer and pulled out the scroll. The mud was still all over the scroll, but with a little searching, it wasn't hard to pull the canvas open.

"Mhmm, I'm not sure what this big fuss is about. It seems like all there is in the scroll are some Mangekyou Sharingan techniques and explanations. So Danzō, what exactly is she being arrested for?" For a second, everyone seemed to freeze in the room. Everyone was looking at Danzō, who furrowed his forehead just a bit. It was not hard to guess that he had never planned for me to live until this point, probably would have saved him a lot of trouble if I had just died earlier.

"Would you like to check for any seals? Or do you want to confirm that it's still the same scroll that your shinobi had discovered on Uchiha Maiko earlier?" That was a trick question. It wasn't malice that was in the Hokage's light inquiry towards Danzō, it was a challenge for him, daring him to infringe further on the Hokage's absolute authority.

This was not the first time during this conversation that I got the feeling of "this is kinda about you, but this is _really not_ about you". It was like those two men of power were discussing on some higher plane, using my case as an example, but really, they were competing for something else. Power? No, that fight wouldn't leave any suspense. Ideals, then.

In the end, it was Elder Shimura who took a step back and surrendered. Of course, there were just no other acceptable outcomes.

"I apologise for the rash decision, Hokage-sama. However, she fought furiously when she was arrested. If she had nothing to hide, she could have just peacefully surrender herself."

… _This whole thing of 'I don't plan to kill you but you decided to kill me and now you didn't get kill me so you plan to accuse me of attacking first' is getting really, really annoying._

"If this is all cleared up, then I will take my leave, Hiruzen. However, I do warn you to remember what the Uchiha and their Sharingans are capable of. Think about what they had planned to do the last time when you had left their eye powers alone. I'm merely making sure that the unfavourable circumstances of the past are not being repeated." That was the last thing he said before he led his lackeys out of the Hokage's office, realising that his schemes were not going to work this time. The door closed with a loud thud, and so did the pounding of my heart.

Something was wrong - not right now, but just beginning to stir in my mind. These two people, they were men of history and they were definitely not just talking about me and this whole suspected treason thing anymore.

"Unfavourable circumstances of the past", what would that make one think of? If this was yesterday, I would undoubtedly arrive at the memory of the Uchiha Massacre, of my brother murdering all of our kin in cold blood. But that was what he 'had done', not what he 'had planned to do'. And "they" suggested more than one person.

Something was wrong with my train of thoughts, but the focus at hand was to make sure the train I was currently riding wouldn't end in a crash. After readjusting my focus, I spoke up, still keeping my eyes on the ground for the sake of safety. "Hokage-sama, I deeply apologise for the mess I've made."

"I am sorry as well that you have to be in this mess. But I wish you could've told me first when something suspicious happened." I dipped my head even lower at the patronising tone in Hokage-sama's voice if that was even possible.

"It's lucky that your friend returned the scrolls for you. As you may know, it's very dangerous to have Anbu mission information leaked. If I hadn't already received the scroll before the council caught wind of this, you would be having a very hard time explaining everything right about now."

"Hokage-sama, I truly didn't know―"

"I know, Maiko, and that's why you were very lucky this time. Take this to the intelligence division and have Inoichi corroborate the information and look for any suspicious signs before destroying it." That last sentence was directed at Kakashi, who took the wooden-spined scroll that had magically appeared from another drawer diligently and exited the office through the Anbu exit in the ceiling. Then, I could feel the scrutinising gaze returning back to me.

"Maiko, regardless of what you think, there has been a report made to me about potentially suspicious activities around Anbu mission storage. The Jōnin Commander and I have been planning to conduct a secret investigation to determine the truth in that. However, now that Danzō has decided to bring it up for the goal of … this, that complicates things."

I frowned at this new piece of information. An information leak was a bad thing, but it really wasn't unheard of, whether it was in the normal department or Anbu. Espionage was quite alive nowadays and every year, the villages tried their hardest to steal information from each other. A security layout, score! Anbu mission details, jackpot! When we get one of those reports, we investigate. If nothing was stolen, great; if not, then we steal the information back and silence anyone who knows.

However, if the matter was about a defective from within, the problem got more complicated. What tangled things, even more, was not knowing which part of the report was true and which part was fabricated, which was a situation that Danzō had effectively created for the Hokage.

This was really not about me. The Hokage was just more mad at Danzō for complicating his investigation.

"So, my question for you is how did you know that the demolishing of Naka Shrine would occur today." It was just one simple question but it gave me more than enough information. One, yes, the Hokage knew of the plan; two, he knew that I was being kept out of this.

"My friend found the order issued by the civilian council and informed me, but he had nothing to do with my decision of going there." I bit my lower lip lightly, wondering if I should ask what I wanted to ask. "Did you … purposely not inform me about the demolition, Hokage-sama?" In the end, I asked anyway.

With my half-raised eyesight, I saw the Hokage putting down whatever report he was reading and rubbing his temple as if to ease the tiredness.

"Yes, that was me." His answer was awfully honest. "I'm sure you've realised that the village owns that property right now, so no matter what you do, you can't stop the civilian council's decision. Knowing about it would only cause you hurt and anger." … Was that really the reason? Suddenly, it sounded really forced. If I had any reaction, the Hokage surely ignored them when he continued his explanation. "Nevertheless, that was before I was informed of the fact that there was still an occupied room in the shrine. With this incident, the demolition would have to be delayed, but it would only be for a week at the most."

"Then may I have my family's scroll back? I went to the shrine to clean out the remaining properties anyway." _Don't show any spite, don't show any sarcasm,_ I chanted silently as I proposed my request. The man stared at me for a few seconds, judging my intentions. But eventually, he pushed the muddy scroll a bit further in my direction and signalled for me to come and get it.

"Thank you, Hokage-sama," I said with a bow as my hands clutched onto the wet material.

"You're welcome. I'm afraid you will have to come to the Intelligence Department at eight. Kakashi has told me of your concern of possible mind control, so I'm ordering Inoichi to perform a mind check on you, then you can go to the hospital for a drug test."

Yamanaka mind check, huh. I supposed that I wasn't off the hook just yet. But then again, the Hokage had every right to confirm or reject any suspicion raised at this point, so I answered with a clear voice, "I understand, Hokage-sama."

Just before I left the office, I remembered that earlier train of unsettling thoughts. "Hokage-sama, if I may ask, what did Elder Shimura mean by 'the unfavourable circumstances of the past'?" Perhaps I was particularly brave today, or just too scared, but I decided to push on.

"What do you think he meant by that?" I didn't need to be a genius to tell that the Hokage was losing patience in that rhetorical question. _The answer is obvious, it should be_ , he was saying, _because there is no other acceptable answer_.

"I have faith in you for not turning out like your brother, but perhaps it's time to move on. Sometimes, it's better not to dwell on the past," The Hokage warned me as the door opened in front of me, signalling the end of the discussion and the time for my exit.

(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

' _Susanoo, the ultimate technique manifested by having both Mangekyou Sharingan activated. Susanoo is created with the user's chakra, by having a humanoid avatar surround the user, this is the ultimate defence technique… Izanagi and Izanami are the two forbidden jutsus of the Uchiha clan. By sacrificing one sharingan, the user can temporarily use Izanagi or Izanami, therefore temporarily alter the line between reality and genjutsu…'_

After scanning through the scroll, I shut it abruptly, not wanting to look any further. In any other time, I would love to just sit here and read through it multiple times, especially the part about Susanoo. But right now, my mind was on something else. None of these techniques mentioned had the same effect as _that_ ; none of these techniques could inject fear into the people of Konoha like _that_ one could.

The nine-tailed beast. The same tailed-beast that the Mangekyou allegedly could control.

That was when it had all started, that night when the village was attacked.

Suddenly, it all clicked. The last piece of the puzzle that fit into everything seamlessly. I remembered my father's sighs when we were forced to build the Uchiha Compound on a different location than before after the nine-tail attack. I remembered Father's frustration when the jurisdiction of the Uchiha Police Department diminished after each and every council meeting. Before, I hadn't thought much of it because I was a selfish child living inside a bubble, but now, it all made sense.

I had formulated some pretty impossible theories before, but none of them explained things as well as this one: My Clan, my family, my father. They had tried to regain power once more in Konoha but in the end, they had failed, because Itachi had killed them all.

When pushed too far, even the rabbit bites back. My clan was pushed too far, so they tried to bite back; my brother was pushed too far, so he did bite back.

What could they be talking about in that sealed off place beneath the Naka Shrine? Fuyuki said it herself, it was built to serve as a war chamber where all plans of war were discussed and drawn out. Why was the Hokage so unwilling to draw my attention to the shrine? Perhaps he was trying to hide any possible clues that might have been left there when my clan members just … disappeared.

Shisui's supposed nonsense in limbo, my clan's tense atmosphere right before the massacre, my father's lack of resistance before his death. The suicide note, the strange exchange between the Hokage and Danzō, the meetings … click, click, click, a horrifying melody was slowly being pieced together.

 _Stop! Just stop!_ The keyword here was "theory". Just because the puzzle pieces seemed to fit on an empty canvas didn't mean it was the only explanation. There were still so many empty spaces, so many bits of unexplained details.

Shisui said that the outcome wasn't as he had expected, so how had they originally planned to end the rebellion? And Danzō, what had he been so nervous about? If the truth were to come out, then the people would only blame the Uchiha for their own stupidity. What was his involvement in all of this?

Ah, suddenly, I started to wish that I had never opened the Pandora's box. _Sorry, girlie, there's no 'undo' button,_ the Gods and the demons had said to Pandora. Once the thoughts seeped in, I just couldn't stop thinking about this horrifying new possibility. So what if, what if it was true? What if it wasn't my brother who had committed treason, but my entire clan?

 _But… it's not like I can blame anyone… my clan made their decisions, so did my brother._

I couldn't believe it, all the rage I had felt before regarding the massacre… where did they go? All I could do was to sit there in dead silence and … _Ah, here's the anger._

 _Crack!_ The teacup in my hand shattered into pieces as scalding hot water soaked through the fabric of my clothes and burned my skin. In front of me, the view kept on changing. The image became clearer and clearer until I could just see the rims of the image glowing red and then―

That was when I closed my eyes before Amaterasu could be unleashed again.

I wanted to blame someone! I wanted to unleash my anger towards this unfair impasse at someone! Oh, I could just imagine my brother's perspective. _If all were to be blamed, then none should be blamed. Therefore, he willingly took the blame for the whole clan so Sasuke and I could live in a pretence …_

Shut up, Itachi. Just shut up.

Mother had once said it was petty to blame others for your misfortune. If that were the case, well then, we were all just petty human beings. I, the Uchiha clan who thought to overthrow a stable government with a powerful military was a good idea, and the villagers who thought that my clan would be stupid enough to release the nine-tail.

Like a new academy student, I tried very hard to suppress my chakra, but it just wouldn't listen. Underneath the eyelids, the wheels shifted and turned. Petals to tomoe, tomoe to black irides, black irides to petals …

 _If, and only if, my clan was really planning a rebellion, then was there really no other way of stopping it? This distrust between the Konoha and the Uchiha. I assumed that Shisui and Itachi tried to do that by stopping our clan's coup, but clearly, Shisui's planned method was different than the real outcome. So what went wrong?_

… the tomoe turned to black iris and it stopped, finally. It seemed that adding a bit of rational inquiry into the mix helped with stabilising the explosives.

 _So what went wrong?_ I tightened my fist around something to force myself to concentrate on the unknown instead. A sharp pain stung at my palm and when I looked down, red blood was already dripping down the broken teacup shard.

"Maiko-senpai!" I almost jumped when I heard the yell from my window. When I turned my ghostly pale face at the source of that voice, I found a Raven-masked boy standing on my window.

"What are you doing here, Ryuu?" I asked, returning my gaze to the broken porcelain pieces fallen all over my lap and on the couch. _Try not to burn him into oblivion, seriously._

"Hokage-sama sent me here to watch you. He thought that you would prefer a familiar face." He answered flawlessly, eyes still on the mess of teacup shards.

"Did he now?" I raised an eyebrow and the boy nodded. So Anbu was here, to keep out Root members? To keep me from leaving before the mind check?

"If you are here as an Anbu, then be a good one and hide from your target," I said to my kouhai as I shooed him lightly with my hands. I was afraid if I had to carry on a conversation any longer, everything would break loose.

Soon, I turned around and started to clean the broken pieces away. Picking up all the shards, I cupped them in my hands and walked towards the trash bin.

It was then when something slammed into me so forcefully and fast that it knocked the wind out of my lungs.

In less than one second, I was being pressed to the floor with a hand wrapped tightly around my neck. The Chakra flow in my body had stopped completely, well, not stopped, but slowed to a point that I couldn't gather anything from it.

"So that's how he got my mission schedule …" I muttered absentmindedly as Ryuu tried his hardest to choke me. His blade - not his usual katana, but the guardless tantō I'd seen so many times in the past few hours - raised above my chest, exactly where I taught him to stab if he were to aim for the heart.

"I'm sorry." That was the last thing I heard as he brought his blade down.

I should have seen this coming, I totally should have, because it would have been a miracle if Danzō had decided to leave me alone. But despite everything I said about judging Ryuu with suspicion, I never thought he would be the invisible thread that belonged to Shimura Danzō.

Why? Compared to everyone else, he had the most suspicious background, an unknown heritage. I supposed it was because he was Akira-shishou's student, my kouhai, and my subordinate. But if Danzō thought he could kill me because of that, then he was very wrong.

Unfortunately, right now, I was like a gun loaded and aimed, ready to fire, and the boy had just walked straight into the gun barrel.

Before the blade could touch my chest, I knocked his other hand on my neck - which supported his weight - away with my elbow. Immediately, the boy lost his balance and instead of a hole in my chest, the tantō made a deep gash on my forearm. The moment his grip on my neck loosened, I flung him off of me and let him crash into the wall.

"If you think you can kill me like that, think again." I could hear the anger radiating in my growls, silencing the boy before he could say anything to defend himself.

"Come on, let's see if my last ten months' teaching has paid off, or did Danzō teach you something I couldn't." I criticised him relentlessly as I brought my hands up to prepare for the close combat. Slowly and shakily, Ryuu stood up, still clutching onto that blasted tantō from Root. For a second, he just stood there, like a deer caught in the headlight, unsure of what to do.

 _Stop acting like you are sorry when you just planned to strike a blade through my heart._ Fine, if he didn't want to move, I would do it. After all, the rule was simple: If you plan to kill someone, then be prepared for the possibility of dying in the process.

He finally brought his sword up at the exact moment my fist arrived at his neck, so instead, I turned and slammed my other elbow at his ribs from the side. As I ducked to avoid a slash that sailed over my head, I heard the familiar crunching sound of the bones.

Since the chakra was circulating again in my body, my first thought was to get a lightning release up and running. However, the moment I started to speed up the flow for a ninjutsu, my eyes acted up again. Black irides to petals, it skipped the mid-step altogether.

 _So, it's all or nothing in terms of jutsu?_ I had to halt for a moment, close my eyes and focus my attention on shutting the chakra system to a minimum. Although I probably wouldn't mind turning the person in front of me into nothingness, there was something wrong with potentially burning the whole building down.

During my sudden stop, I could feel the cold wind brushing against my skin, signifying the direction of the next strike.

Something sliced down without hesitation, but it narrowly missed my collarbone as I stepped to the side at the last moment. Then, I felt something crashing into my ankle, making me fall backwards ungracefully.

Falling would be a horrible option here, so I just did a backflip, kicking my leg up in the process, aiming right for the position of his head. The tantō arrived just in time to block my kick to the jaw. When I landed on my feet again, my chakra system was finally stable enough for me to open my eyes.

Breathe in, breathe out. If I can't control any ninjutsu, then I might as well not use any. With that in mind, I bolted towards the intruder once again.

Perhaps if Danzō had chosen any other assassin, the outcome would have been different. But whatever was Ryuu's deal, he fought like he had thrown everything he had learned out of the window and devolved back to an inexperienced genin.

It wasn't even suspenseful anymore when he crashed into the wooden floor face first. Before he could regain his balance, I held him on the floor via a knee on the spine.

"Here's a news flash: I gave you a life before, and I can take it back," I whispered as I leant over his head. Usually, this was where I wrap my arms around his neck and twist it with full force. But for some reason, as I looked at his vulnerable and exposed neck, I decided against it. Instead, I gripped onto his sword arm and pulled, dislocating his shoulder.

Anger was one thing, but I still retained a sense of rationality. Before I could find the link between him and Danzō and be sure that he was sent by the man, if he were to die in my house, then it would only bite me back in the end.

There was this period of silence as his arm went limp until the sound of his tantō clashed with the floor, breaking that pause. For some reason, he had stopped struggling, nor did he try to fling me off. We just stayed in that position, with my hands still holding tightly onto his shoulder and my knee digging into his back.

"I'm sorry," That seemed to be the only thing he could repeat today, and it made me want to laugh my head off.

"For what? For not being able to complete Danzō's mission?" _Come on, say it, give me something I can use against him._

"No… I couldn't do it… I couldn't say no to his orders …" At first, I thought he was just having trouble speaking because of my tight hold. But soon, I realised that something was very wrong, because the boy underneath me was shaking uncontrollably, and this spasm caused him to be unable to say another word.

"Ryuu? Ryuu!" I yelled as I quickly got off him and flipped him over. By now, he looked like he was having a seizure with the amount of foam coming out of his mouth. I tried to calm him down, but nothing worked. All I could do was to stare helplessly, wondering what the hell was going on.

"Hang on! Just tell me how to stop this, please!" I pleaded, but all he did was making some choking sound. Very weakly, he raised his hand and pointed at his face or something, but as soon as I caught that glimpse of his gesture, he went paralysed on the floor. Except for the fact that I could feel his heartbeat, there was nothing distinguishing him from a corpse.

"No! Wait, don't do this to me!" _Please don't make this some kind of cyanide suicide pills!_ I prayed as I wrenched open his mouth. I was quite hopeful when I didn't smell any poison, but then, I laid my eyes on the black figure on his tongue.

 _Did he brand you already?_ I remembered Kakashi had once asked me that. So was this what he was talking about, some kind of secret fail-safe just in case the agents want to spill? From what I knew of my old world, yes, that was very likely. But this one, it was no pills or mini-bombs, this was a seal, which meant that I had no idea how to deal with this.

Unfortunately for me, I didn't have the time to figure it out anyway. Crack. My shoulder bone just popped out of its socket. _The hell―_ and I was once again being thrown onto the floor.

A flash of dark metal appeared in the corner of my eye. No time to gasp for pain, apparently. With a swift roll to the side, I narrowly dodged the kunai to my head. Quickly, I rolled up to get a good look while still clutching my dislocated right arm to prevent it from getting worse.

Falcon. _Why?_

He looked different from Ryuu, well, in terms of being an assassin. He wasn't in any uniform, nor did he have that signature Root tantō. The only weapon in his hand was a kunai that he put in his pocket just in case something went wrong. In fact, he looked like he was taking a walk when he was off-duty and just suddenly decided to join in―

Oh. He was most likely in a genjutsu.

As I was running the diagnosis in my head, he was already charging again. His movements were a bit sluggish compared to the usual - could be explained by the lagging in perception due to genjutsu - and there was no recognition in his eyes. None at all. Somehow, I got a feeling that he was seeing a different world than me.

 _Okay, step number one, use the Sharingan to identify the area affected and then use chakra to break him out_ ― I didn't even finish that thought before my eyes just took the cue and changed at the first flare of chakra.

My right eye landed on the couch behind Falcon, and the furniture was on fire.

 _Wait, stop!_ I closed my eyes in the middle of the battle. The next thing I knew, a strong force hit my chest and I was on the floor again. A heavy weight stopped me from getting up and an iron grip tightened around my throat. I couldn't make a sound, and there was definitely no air for me to try the 'breathe in, breathe out' method.

I heard a sound and felt a slight movement above my head - the kunai. Without thinking, I brought my hands up. A cold metal surface scraped past my hand and at that exact moment, my hand grabbed onto him, halting the weapon in mid air.

His other hand was still choking the life out of me, but I managed to find one of his fingers and _snap!_ Fortunately, the kunai fell out of his hand and landed beside my head with a cling. Unfortunately, that didn't break him out of the genjutsu.

 _A genjutsu that completely overrides a pain sensory system … no, perhaps the genjutsu itself already takes the factor of pain into consideration when it programs a new scene, meaning it's tricking the brain to think the pain is expected and normal. Adding to the fact that it completely replaces the old setting, this is an amazing genjutsu that even I will have to use the Mangekyou for a chance to cast._

 _So is the Sharingan the only option …_ No, that couldn't be. The chance of me setting him on fire was too great and with this matter, I couldn't accept that margin of error. Come on, I lived a life before this chakra thing started to invade my sense of normality, so there was got to be way out without chakra.

Those thoughts seemed like they had taken up a long time, but in reality, perhaps only two seconds had passed. My hand went straight to the kunai that had just fallen and at the same time, I opened my eyes. Black irides, no chakra flow, nothing special.

I needed to release myself from the choke hold first, so that meant I needed to immobilise Falcon. _But where?_ Small cuts wouldn't do the trick now that pain wasn't an option, and nowhere fatal because that would just defeat the purpose.

The lack of oxygen was making my brain lag as time passed. Elbow then, if I cut a tendon ever so slightly, it would render his arm useless. Got to be careful though, if I cut too deep, I might just ruin his career. No hard feelings.

The hesitation left me as I locked onto the targeted spot, but still, my movement was halted in mid-air, simply because the weight on me was suddenly gone. The choke hold was released and immediately, I gasped for oxygen despite the pain it caused me to breathe.

Somewhere in the background, I heard a crash and then there was silence. Right away, I readied the kunai just in case there was a third one coming, but when I finally saw exactly who it was that had flung my assailant away, I fell back down in relief,

It was actually a pack of dogs, all of whom I was so glad to see. Their owner arrived through the window a few moments later.

"Can you tell me what's going on?" He asked and all I could do was shake my head, so he didn't waste any time and walked over to check the two fallen bodies on my apartment floor. _Oh, the fire, please tell me the fire is gone now._ Turned out, it was extinguished, and what went with it was most of my couch.

"He's paralysed by the seal, but I don't know how to release it. Your other teammate, however, doesn't have the Root seal, but other than a concussion, he does have a chakra circuit in his brain more messed up than Kirigakure."

My brain functions had just barely returned when I heard his words. _Genjutsu, that was definitely a genjutsu._ Suddenly, I was very thankful that it had actually left a mess instead of that subtle mind control technique where I couldn't even find a trace of. Tiredly, I swiped the hair out of my face and just laid there and tried to breathe. It hurt. It really hurt, every breath I took felt like a saw was ripping down my trachea.

By the time I found the strength to push myself up from the ground, Kakashi was already ordering the ninkens to carry out the two intruders. Just watching the scene in front of me, my head suddenly became heavier as my eyes found it increasingly hard to focus.

 _In less than one day, Danzō has pretty much ruined half of my life._

 _This isn't even a proper assassination attempt. It was just a warning. Look, he seemed to be saying, look at these two, I could ruin your life in more ways than you could imagine. Using all kinds of methods, all kinds of people, even making you ruin your own life._

The world fell silent as I gasped for air. I just wanted to make a sound, any sound! But I couldn't even breathe as some imaginary hand tightened around my throat and squeezed harder and harder until every last―

 _Pop._ "Aaugh!" The sound escaped without me even realising it as _someone_ popped my shoulder back into its socket. The yell had a hoarse undertone that made it sound more like a dying gurgle of a dog. But nevertheless, I realised that I could still make a sound which meant that air was still passing through my larynx and into my lungs.

"I told you to be prepared for the pain." He probably did, but I was just too far away to hear it. Now that the newest pain on my shoulder was so overwhelming, the feeling of suffocation faded into the background.

"Come on, I need to get all of you back to the Hokage's tower," Kakashi said as he ushered his ninkens to drag or carry the unconscious people out of the window. "You can still walk, right?"

I nodded without a word.

 _You cannot freeze under the fear,_ I told myself repeatedly. _You can't break, you just can't. One show of weakness and you're dead; one more and the people around you will be as well. Besides, you still have things you want to know._ I took a deep breath regardless of the pain it caused and laid my eyes on where my couch would have been.

The one-fifth remainder of the couch fell lopsided on the ground, revealing the swords on the ground. It seemed that Ryuu had kicked my swords under the couch before he attacked me. I grabbed them before leaving the apartment and off we went to see one of two men who knew the history of the Uchiha Massacre.

Is it better to not dwell on the past? Perhaps that would apply before I had opened the Pandora's box. No, actually, it was never possible to begin with.

That part of the past had always been a demon within, hungry for the truth, no matter how ugly it was.

* * *

A/N: phew, that was long, anyway, I felt so foreign with my writing style after a month of not touching it, like, I think some of my pent up anger with exams got carried over here ... What's it called, creator's breakdown? Anyway, Sharingan-brand image editing tool, just one eyeball away, and it's yours.


	39. Chapter 39 - Decidophobia

Yeah, I know I haven't been updating for like a month, and that has to do with me trying to rewrite this arc and completely revamping my story outline. I used to be able to do weekly updates because I have chapters ahead saved, but now, I pretty much have to edit big portions of one chapter, if not completely. Along with real-life issues, I'm also having a major writer's block on this section, so bad that my beta and I did essay-length character analyses in order to figure out if the plot is going correctly and stuff but not much motivation on actually writing the thing. However, I'm done the next two chapter, so this update will have two chapters.

Beta'd by Alice J

Update 1/2

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Chapter 39 - Decidophobia

"Stop touching your neck! It will only worsen your bruising. For someone who breaks other's necks for a living, you are awfully uninformed with the fragility of that particular body part." When Kakashi heard my muffled grunt of pain for the third time, he finally snapped. The moment we landed in Hokage-sama's office with two unconscious bodies in toll, Commander Nara started to work his magic and got us medical help while the Hokage disappeared to somewhere private. So now, my neck was better but the bruising and the aching still remained.

I gave no indication that I had heard him at all and turned my attention back to the medical reports in my hand.

The first one was mine. Under the section of blood tests, some strange figures indicated the injection of a foreign substance of similar composition to soldier pills. Immediately, I understood why my chakra had been going haywire today. Normally, the chakra restricting handcuffs restricted the chakra flow and the body would condition itself to stop generating chakra. Otherwise, every prisoner nowadays would die of overproduction of chakra. However, drugs such as soldier pills stimulate the production of chakra and result in a severely unstable chakra system.

The second one underneath was Falcon's. Concussion, that was the main reason why he was still unconscious. Surprisingly, the genjutsu that I had thought would rival a Mangekyou Sharingan had been very easy to break. Kakashi had only looked at him for one second before the chakra circuit started to return to normal. However, before that had happened, the medic unit managed to record a figure of his disrupted chakra pattern.

As I held out that piece of paper in front of me and examined the image, a random Anbu dropped by and whispered something to Kakashi, who repeated the words to me a second later.

"The initial investigation showed that Falcon had no contact with Elder Shimura over the past three days and that there was no witness that could identify Elder Shimura placing a genjutsu on him. In fact, Danzō has an alibi placing him nowhere near your apartment or Falcon's route home. After your earlier visit to the office, he had stayed in the tower to discuss things with the Hokage." _Well, isn't that just great, has anyone checked if he had made a shadow clone? Alibi doesn't mean a damn thing in this world._ I commented silently as the Anbu disappeared quickly, leaving the two of us to remain sitting in the Hokage's office, staring at a map of someone's brain.

"Let me guess, this scan is useless as well." I heard my own bland and cracking voice - something I thought I would never have the grace of hearing again.

Every genjutsu user has learned the rule to never leave your own chakra behind for sensors to identify. Flow your chakra as close to your target as possible, hypnotising their chakra circuit to do what you want, but after that, retract your chakra as quickly as possible. Most genjutsu only require the caster's chakra to be active for a second, any other follow-up was simply checking in to reinforce or prolong the effect. Some Hyūga once told me that the only methods by which he identified genjutsu were one, a disrupted chakra circuit, and two, the flare in the caster's chakra system. He had never seen a genjutsu in which the user had so blatantly left behind their own foreign chakra signature in the target's brain.

"There is no concrete evidence that Danzō was the one who placed a genjutsu on Falcon." Even if I had already arrived at this conclusion, my heart still went cold when I heard him saying it out loud. "He wasn't in the position to cast it, and besides, he wasn't exactly known for being an expert in genjutsu. The scan pattern will be filed but I doubt it will get a match in the database. We would have to see if there's anything Falcon had seen when he wakes up."

The database he was referring to was a collection of brain circuit disturbance patterns collected from various genjutsu injuries over the past decade. Similar overall patterns could suggest the same type of genjutsu being cast; smaller details in the patterns could suggest the caster being the same person, as most genjutsu users had habits in how they liked to influence the chakra circuit. However, since the collection was mostly of Konoha shinobi who has unfortunately wandered into foreign shinobi's genjutsu, I sincerely doubted that Danzō's record was in it. Besides, the matching system was unreliable since genjutsu never takes a very concrete form like other ninjutsu, it was mostly used for medical purposes rather than for identifying suspects.

See, the scary thing about Danzō was not just that he seemed to be everywhere but the fact that you could be very aware of who wants to kill you, yet there was no way to get them to suffer any repercussions. That was what made the fear stronger.

 _If Danzō didn't have the opportunity to cast a genjutsu on him during that window of time after the whole shrine thing, then how did he do it? The genjutsu couldn't have been activated any sooner because the people he was with earlier didn't notice any abnormal reactions and most of them were sensors who would have sensed any foreign chakra carrying the genjutsu. Could he have cast a genjutsu from a distance? No, then the Hokage would have noticed his actions. Then what if the genjutsu could be activated independently of the caster's actions? Is that even possible? All the genjutsu I have heard of require the caster to be in the close vicinity of the target and the genjutsu should take effect as soon as the command is sent, not remaining dormant. Besides, if the caster weren't there to assess the situation, there is no way the genjutsu could be this convincing that it could fool an Anbu agent …_

My train of impossible thoughts got interrupted when the office door swung open, and the Hokage entered with his Jōnin Commander. As Hokage-sama passed me by, he gave me such a sad look as if someone had just died… I really wished that that wasn't the case.

"That boy from Root … I can't completely reverse the seal, nor can I take it off, but I did place a seal to counteract the effect so that the paralysis would wear off. However, because of the interference between two seals, he won't be able to make a sound for the time being. Should he ever try to do something that will activate the Root curse seal again, it will kill him." As if he had already known what I wanted to ask, he spoke up the moment he sat down on the chair. Was I happy that Ryuu was still alive? Was I angry? I had no idea, but I did know that we had no way of interrogating him for information on Danzō.

Silence. Unbearable silence. I guess it was the time for that, then.

"My clan … they were planning a coup d'état, weren't they?" It was definitely not the best time to talk about that. My hoarse voice suddenly carried so much weight despite the low volume.

 _I want an answer … no, I don't … but I really do …_ So, which one was it?

The Hokage chose it for me because I saw him nodding, the pain in his eyes leaking out like a dam had finally cracked. _Why? Why are you so sad, when my family was the traitor?_

"So Itachi killed them to prevent the rebellion. Did you know that? Did you know what Itachi was going to do?" I asked again, albeit with more anger this time. When I saw the tiny little nod from the Hokage, that was when all my suppressed anger burst out.

"So you just watched him do it, killing his own clan members one by one, not lifting a finger to stop it. I guess you wouldn't, why would you? When Itachi could have saved you a lot of trouble." I was very aware of the fact that my volume was probably way over what was appropriate right now but I couldn't care less. All the anger that had seemed to disappear all came back the moment I found a target to unleash it on.

"It wasn't like that, Maiko…"

"So enlighten me, tell me the truth, the whole truth. And for once, we may be able to scratch away the lies and the facade everyone here seems to be able to see past but me." Despite my rude interruption, the Hokage just sighed and nodded.

"The coup, when I first caught wind of it, it was Itachi and Shisui who told me. From then on, it had always been them who were the double spies, giving me information on the Uchiha clan's progress. I had planned for a peaceful intervention, to stop the rebellion without any bloodshed. At first, everyone was skeptical that it would work but it was your cousin, Shisui, who provided a solution." He paused a bit, taking another deep breath.

"He knew that just by talking to them, the chance of the Uchiha elders coming to their senses was low, so he suggested that he use his Mangekyou Sharingan's ability: Kotoamatsukami." My eyes widened at the revelation. There it was, the second piece of the eternal puzzle that I just couldn't figure out myself.

"Kotoamatsukami is a special kind of genjutsu. By using two eyes at the same time, Shisui was able to influence the target's mental thoughts quite a bit without them even realising it. In a way, Kotoamatsukami was the strongest genjutsu because the target wouldn't even be able to realise that they were under the influence of someone else. The plan was for him to influence the participants of the meeting, and then I would have been able to persuade them to lower their arms and reach a peaceful conclusion." Suddenly, it all made sense, every piece of the puzzle fit together the moment the critical piece had appeared.

"But something went wrong because Shisui died before he could do it," I whispered slowly but it sounded so loud in the room where no one else was taking an audible breath.

"That's right. The night of the massacre was the date I had planned to talk to the Uchihas, and the day before that was supposed to be the day when Shisui would use the Kotoamatsukami but he died instead. Therefore, I was very surprised when Itachi arrived with the news that Shisui had committed suicide. I was still planning to try the peace talk regardless, hoping that it can hinder the coup even if just by a little. But when I arrived with several Anbu teams, it was already too late." Ah, so that's what happened. It sounded so absurd and strange, no wonder I couldn't figure out the truth myself. There was no way that I could have considered the possibility of a coup, nor could I have guessed Shisui's abilities.

The Uchiha was my clan. Even if I didn't realise it, I was already biased for them from the beginning.

"The next morning, I found Itachi waiting for me in my office, reporting to me about the mission of massacring the Uchiha clan. I hadn't issued it but Itachi claimed that the mission was from me. Eventually, I found out that it was Danzō who issued the mission to the young Itachi under my name, and when we realised it, it was already too late. Before Itachi left, we reached the agreement that I would protect you and Sasuke, never telling you two the truth of what had really happened, while Itachi willingly took on the missing-nin status in order to work outside of Konoha as a spy. I am so sorry that I couldn't keep my promise to him… everything Danzō did to you, it shouldn't have ever happened…"

He said something else after that, but I didn't hear it. It was all too much for me; everything overwhelmed my already messed up brain like a flood. Every bit of information was chipping away my inside piece by piece. Sorrow, regret, and most of all, rage. I didn't cry, at least, I didn't feel the salty tears, but God knows how much my heart was bleeding.

 _I cry for you, Itachi, because everything you did, everything you were forced to do, I know that it made your heart break. I cry for you, Shisui, because for all your brightness and optimism, you had to use it to fight the darkness behind your back._

This tragic tale of the two - no, not just the two, but all of us - was so different than the tragedy I was used to. This tragic tale wasn't gruesome or horrifying, it was not full of torture; but rather, somehow, it sounded poetic.

So mockingly poetic like something straight out of a propaganda. The caption read: Love, Loyalty, Duty.

 _So, what of it? Who gives a fuck._

It was supposed to be a grotesque tale of death and revenge, so when did it become a tragic poem of heroism and sacrifice? It was a massacre, for god's sake. A fucking massacre.

It was so tragic, but, was it tragic without a cause? If Shisui hadn't died, then everything could have ended so differently, if only… his eyes. Where did his eyes go? Kotoamatsukami, the genjutsu that controls the human mind without leaving a clue… why did that sound so familiar?

"He took it. He took Shisui's eye." Somehow, I managed to open my mouth despite the streams of saltiness that ran past my lips.

"Danzō, he took Shisui's eye before he could perform the genjutsu on the clan." By now, everyone was staring at me, not that they hadn't been before since I was sure that they already thought of me as a time bomb waiting to explode.

When nobody spoke anything about the bomb that I had just dropped, I snapped. "Do something! Aren't you supposed to do something! You are the Hokage!" _What do I even want him to do? Execute Danzō? Gouge his eyes out? Yes, I want that. I want that very much._

The Hokage didn't answer me. Perhaps he was still digesting my accusation about Shisui's eyes, or perhaps he thought that gaining the truth was the last step I needed and he couldn't quite think of the next step.

 _How comical, I used to think that I would be satisfied the moment I find out the truth but I guess not._

"So, once again, you are going to do nothing," I mocked him despite knowing that I shouldn't. "Why would you let Danzō live after all he did? You must have known that he had Root wrapped around his finger, driving a hole through your personal Anbu force."

"Maiko, it's not that simple!" Oh, this time, Hokage-sama finally got angry, "Even _if_ your claim is true, there are a lot more factors in play that you don't know of."

"You are right, I don't. But I do know that he was the one who ordered my brother to kill all his clan members _after_ he took my cousin's eye and in turn foiled any chance of stopping the rebellion peacefully. Maybe it isn't fair to judge him like that because my clan was the one who started the coup, but it wasn't like he was working very hard to stop all that, was he?" The volume of my voice raised little by little

"Even if we forget about the Uchiha rebellion and the massacre, do you know that over the last twelve hours, he has already attempted to frame me and kill me, _twice_. Let's not forget that he tried to screw with my mind in order to get me to join his little Root faction, using the exact same thing as what you just described as being my cousin's eye ability." I couldn't understand, why was Danzō still alive, because everything he did qualified him as being a missing-nin ten times more than Itachi.

"I understand your reasoning but saying that Danzō took Shisui's eye is a bit of a stretch." At the sound of Hokage-sama's painful voice, I looked up and stared at the seasoned face of the Sandaime Hokage.

"And you believe that Shisui would just go and commit suicide like that? Right, how could I forget, he is an Uchiha, so you don't trust him, despite that he was willing to sacrifice his relationship with his blood family to help you." I must have struck a nerve because immediately, the Hokage released a wave of pressure that seemed to choke the words out of me.

"I am going to be straightforward here, Maiko. I understand your pain and hurt, so everything that happened here can be forgiven. But what do you want to accomplish, and think carefully before you speak." The authoritative voice rang across the room, it was so powerful that just a whisper of it could render me speechless.

"I want him to be held accountable. Shimura Danzō, he sabotaged your peaceful attempts and ultimately, he murdered my whole clan and made my brother a traitor. Everyone paid the price, so why didn't he?" I pushed through the thick pressure in the air and voiced my desire. I was going to say that 'I want him dead', but that kind of language just wouldn't flow in here. Maybe I had made the right choice because Hokage-sama's intense aura lessened considerably.

"This isn't some blame game that you can just pin on one person. Even though I agree that Danzō's actions were immoral and should be punished, there are a lot more factors to be considered. Therefore, you shouldn't ever act on your own. It's best if you don't do anything right now because ..."

"Then what am I supposed to do! Watch him try to kill me and do nothing? I've heard you say 'I'll deal with it' plenty of times, and look how effective it was the first time around." _What did Shimura Danzō do, who the hell is he that made him be above every rule in this village?_ But I guess that explained why he wanted me dead. From the moment he used Kotoamatsukami on me and _failed_ , he knew that I would figure out his involvement, the dark secret that he hid from even the Hokage.

"It's sickening, just staying here." _I can't stay here, I can't control my emotions here, not when every one of their passive attitudes pisses me off._ I was afraid that I would burn the building to the ground had I stayed any longer.

 _Click._ With one twist, the door opened so easily that it surprised me. I stared at the open window across the hallway, and then, I took a brief glimpse behind me. The people in the room seemed to be thinking deeply about something, which seemed to be an ability that I had temporarily lost.

So I didn't think. Instead, instinct took over.

Fight or flight. I had fought all this time, so I supposed it was time for flight instead.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

The last twelve hours had been way too ridiculous, Kakashi concluded. It was like everything was in a rush to get out. The secrets, the lies, the truth. They all wanted to get out and completely ignored the mentality of the person who had to take them.

See, Kakashi was sure that he wasn't supposed to be in the room. He should have left when Maiko first said the words 'coup d'état', but the Hokage started to explain everything before he could get out and the privacy seal had already been activated then.

So, he was stuck, listening to a story he shouldn't have intruded on in the first place, wondering why the Hokage hadn't booted him out in the first place.

The truth behind the Uchiha Massacre was … not completely unexpected. Three years ago, Kakashi, along with some thirty _visible_ Anbu, had accompanied the Hokage to the peace talks for the sake of precaution. Before he had left, the Hokage had pulled out the Anbu Commander, a few Anbu captains which included Kakashi, and told them to be especially careful of a chance of violence, for the Uchiha clan might resort to rebellious actions if the peace talks did not go well.

Kakashi had been keenly aware of the tension and the increasing violent scuffles (hello, it was part of his job to spy on them) definitely more so than Maiko. He had looked at the Uchiha Clan as a potential threat while she was looked at them as a relic full of memories and longing. He didn't know if the Uchiha clan had already planned out the coup, or was considering a coup, or if it had just been a rumour. The Hokage's reminder seemed to suggest the former but then again, Anbu had been there for precaution, which applied to both a rumour and a confirmed event.

So Kakashi had followed the Hokage into the Uchiha Compound, readied his Sharingan and expected to fight off any violence - by using violence. Instead, he saw no actual violence, only the piles of bodies that showed its aftermath.

After that, Kakashi had wondered, should he tell Maiko that the Uchiha Clan _might_ have attempted to start a rebellion? The answer was no. He wasn't allowed, by the Hokage's order, and also, it didn't help anything.

' _Sorry, but your family might be - like, at least by a fifty percent chance - starting a rebellion right before they were all killed, coincident much?'_ was not something that one just brought up in casual training sessions.

Uchiha Itachi's actions baffled him for the longest time. He was such a perfect little soldier, and so peace-loving as well, always trying to find a solution for the tension between the Uchiha Clan and the village. So why would he go and kill his entire clan - the old, the young, the shinobi, and the civilians? Kakashi felt that unless Itachi was crazy, 'trying to lessen the tension by eliminating one party' was not a valid explanation for his actions.

Then again, the majority of the Clan Heads never understood the reason behind Itachi's actions either and yet they still crowned him as an S-rank traitor. The reason didn't matter; it was the fact that he killed his entire clan - more than three hundred people - in one night and someone this cold blooded and powerful wasn't under Konoha's control.

But now, he sort of understood. One, the coup had been real. Very real. Two, it had been Danzō who had ordered the massacre. Three, Itachi had been desperate after Shisui's plan had failed.

It was the sound of the door opening that brought him back to the reality. A reality so unreal that Kakashi was still considering the possibility of it being a genjutsu. When he realised that the girl in the room was gone, he was ready to pursue her. However, it seemed that his reaction time wasn't as fast as the Anbu guarding the office. The team of six rushed out of the tower, chasing the figure flickering away at an amazing speed. But hey, on the bright side, it seemed that the chakra stabilising drug worked.

"Stay for a second, Kakashi." The Hokage called out to him just as he was about to join the Anbu and Kakashi wondered why. What could possibly be more important than making sure that Maiko was not raging over Konoha or worse, being attacked by Root?

Danzō, he liked to prey on people's weaknesses, especially ones of the heart. Although Kakashi seriously doubted that he'd be able to gain anything out of Maiko, who had nothing but fury at the moment. He knew that for someone like Danzō, if he couldn't use Maiko, he might as well destroy her.

"I need you to listen to what I have to say and explain everything to her. She will not listen to me right now, but she might listen to you." Now Kakashi understood why he had the privilege of listening in. Remember back when Maiko first joined Anbu? Yeah, Kakashi's first job was being her teacher and the second? Defusing the unstable bomb should it ever decide to explode. Thankfully, the method was unspecified.

From observing the Hokage's earlier attitude, Kakashi saw reluctance in dealing with Danzō. So he was very curious in how the man had planned to solve this. _Because let's face it, the village is horrible in repaying loyal shinobi. What did the village ever do for Hatake Sakumo? For Uchiha Shisui? For Uchiha Itachi?_ Kakashi gulped down that treasonous thought, knowing that it was definitely not the time to doubt his own beliefs.

"It was never my intention for it to come to this. Perhaps I really have been leaving Danzō alone for too long." The Hokage-sama said, his voice full of regret and sadness, and Kakashi concurred. Danzō had always been a loose cannon in Konoha, and worst of all, he was an ambitious loose cannon with lots of support.

"You need to tell her that I do plan to do something about Danzō, notably, removing him from his position of power and forcefully disbanding his Root. However, Uchiha Maiko cannot attack Danzō, no matter what." The Hokage said the last sentence with heavy emphasis on Maiko's name but that just baffled Kakashi even more.

Kakashi wanted to remind the Hokage that it had only been less than twelve hours since Danzō first approached Maiko. From then on, he had made one attempt of forced recruitment, one attempt of framing her for treason, and three attempts in total for killing her. So wouldn't self-defence be a valid reason?

"The biggest leverage Danzō had was not Root, it was information." Thankfully, the Hokage started to elaborate.

"The fact that the Uchiha Clan had tried to rebel was enough to bury Maiko should she ever attack Danzō without a strong reason supported by much evidence, which she does not have." At this point, the Hokage had taken off his hat and leant back into his chair with signs of fatigue.

"The plan to execute all of those involved in the planning of massacre was not just fiction. It was the backup plan for a backup plan in dealing with the Uchiha rebellion. Therefore, if the village knew that the Uchiha had tried to rebel, Danzō's order was not in the wrong, but Maiko's action of attacking him could be interpreted as seeking revenge for traitors and she would be branded one as well."

"What of the bloodline theft?" Kakashi asked, trying to gain all the answers which Maiko might want to know if she was ever calm enough to listen.

"Konoha protects all citizens from bloodline thievery, but the Uchiha was removed from that protection when they had tried to rebel. It is true that Uchiha Shisui was not a part of the rebellion, but Danzō could argue that Shisui was actually trying to use his Mangekyou for treasonous purposes and that he himself was just acting in the interest of Konoha. In the end, it would inadvertently expose the truth of the Uchiha Massacre anyway, which would only benefit him." The Hokage paused, letting the dreading silence prepare for the graveness of his next sentence: "The truth behind the Uchiha Massacre is something that can never be said in public. For her sake, and for the village's sake."

"Then what's stopping him from releasing the information?" Kakashi inquired reluctantly. It seemed to him that there was no better way to damage Maiko's reputation.

"The opinions of the clans." The Sandaime answered in all seriousness. "The Uchiha rebellion had not caused substantial damage to the village, therefore, Danzō's strong armed decision would create distaste among the powerful clans. However, if one of the Uchiha descendants, say, Maiko, had caused damage to the village in her pursuit of revenge, then Danzō's actions would be more acceptable and the existence of Root would be proven as a beneficial type of law-enforcement agency."

Basically, if Maiko had managed to succeed in killing him - which is unlikely considering the fact that Danzō was basically luring her into attacking him, he had to have some kind of plan - she was not walking away scot-free. If Maiko doesn't succeed, well, she would be dead, with a proper reason crowned on her name.

 _And it was all because of one stupid decision made by one clan in desperate times._

"I didn't think that Danzō's distaste for the Uchiha was this strong. He was heavily influenced by the Nidaime Hokage, we all were. In this generation, the Senju clan had almost disappeared but the Uchiha clan proliferated in numbers, producing one prodigy after another. Perhaps the Uchiha Massacre was just Danzō trying to keep their power in check but I thought he would stop after the Uchiha clan was reduced to only two children." When the Hokage muttered with such sadness, Kakashi realised that like all people, the leader of Konoha could be fooled by sentimentality. He could try to feel empathetic towards the man, but he was not going to do that right now because he was still getting answers for Maiko. Therefore, he continued to probe further.

"And Root? You said that you wanted to disband Root once again."

"Root, like Danzō, is dangerous in that they know quite a bit of information. Danzō has spies all over the continent, if Danzō decides for them to release any important information, the damage could be irreversible. I do not know if he would really do such a thing to harm Konoha, but I can't take any chances. So I had to snip all the vines before dealing with the main Root force. From a few months ago, when I had known of the continuation of Root, I ordered Jiraiya and his spy network to pull out the exact location of these 'spies' that Danzō had claimed to be dead. By now, we should have all of these spies' locations under surveillance. However, tonight's event hindered my plan of forcefully disbanding Root." As if on cue, the Jōnin Commander whisked out a thick file with a seal that only allowed Anbu access.

"The information of the spies' identities, the approximate number of Root agents who are still active, and the location of their base is in this file, kept in the highest security level of Anbu Archive room." Commander Nara didn't need to say anything more, Kakashi quickly caught the gist of it.

Ryuu was a Root member - a Root member who had infiltrated Anbu. It was definitely unclear how many other Anbu were actually Root in disguise. It was highly possible that all of the information had been leaked, which meant that most of it would be useless at best and misleading at worst.

"Now, I'm sure you are aware of the cursed Root seal that was placed on all members. By comparing the seals on Raven and Bear, there was one significant difference: the newer seal has a cloaking seal incorporated as a part of it allows it to be invisible unless activated." _So we can't just wrench out everyone's tongue for a check up,_ Kakashi mentally noted.

"Just minutes ago, I've notified Jiraiya to start working on an identification seal that will expose the Root seals instead of deactivating them, since that would take way too long. His spy network is also back in business to track all potential spies added by Danzō. From the last screening, the estimated number of agents in Root was around two hundred, including thirty-four outside as spies, but I suspect that both of these numbers have increased in secret."

Now, the current available Anbu the village could deploy was around six hundred, excluding all the potential infiltrators and minus those that would need to be sent out for 'snipping the vine' … actually, Kakashi had no idea how many would be left but nevertheless, raiding the Root base would definitely require the whole Anbu force with barely enough to spare for the Hokage's safety.

But still, Kakashi felt that Danzō was snapping way too quickly. He had spies in Anbu, yet he jeopardised all that for the sake of killing Maiko. If he had been more patient, he might have been able to plan a coup himself - oh, the irony of politics that Kakashi could not understand.

"It will take at least a few days for Jiraiya's seal design to be relayed back to Konoha even if he is working at light speed, and before all the Anbu is combed through, I cannot make a move against Root and Danzō." The Hokage's voice cracked a bit due to the long speech he had given, so he paused and reached out for a cup of water.

Kakashi's eyes wandered over to the broken window, wondering if the Anbu team had successfully caught up to Maiko. "Wait … if Anbu is not safe anymore, then …" _Why are you letting Anbu protect her safety?_

Kakashi had only realised how stupid that question sounded after he ran through the words in his mind. _Who else, other than Anbu, could the Hokage use?_ The Hokage was supposed to have full control over Anbu but that was before Danzō had crashed the party.

"Bear is the leader of that team, besides, their order was to guard her from afar and prevent any contact with Root." Just like the calm undertone of the Hokage's voice, life had to carry on just like it had been before. They not only had to use Anbu, they had to do it without any hint of suspicion.

Kakashi didn't know if the people in this room just didn't realise this or that they just consciously tried to avoid this particular topic. No one in this room had mentioned anything about how to deal with Danzō specifically.

Kakashi suspected that the only reason, well, the main one anyway, that the Hokage was so willing to deal with Root was because of its reach in Anbu that threatened the integrity of Konoha's security system. But was dealing with Root enough to stop Danzō? Just because the teeth of a tiger has been pulled out, it doesn't mean that the tiger has any less desire to devour its prey.

The Hokage wanted Root gone (or more likely, 'reintegrated'), but what did Maiko want? In all likeliness, she didn't give a damn about Root; it was Danzō. Whether it was a hundred Root members or just one that she had to plough through, it clearly didn't matter. It wasn't exactly a conflict of interest, but definitely a conflict of priority.

Now he just had to convince her to forget about the single biggest enemy that was mostly responsible for her family's massacre for a couple of days because publicity was bad for the large scale raid they wanted to accomplish.

Easy. No biggie. He wanted to go jump off a cliff.

Suddenly, Kakashi remembered that old phrase "don't shoot the messenger". He never believed it. If it weren't for people constantly killing the messenger, that quote wouldn't exist in the first place. He glanced across the room and saw the business face the Jōnin Commander had put on. However, he could have sworn that what he saw underneath was 'why did I get dragged into this/why is this thing blowing up now/why am I always the one cleaning up the mess'. Their eyes met and at that moment, it was as though they had a mutual understanding.

"Sir," suddenly, a bear-masked figure appeared on the window side in a blur, "she went into the Uchiha Compound and hasn't come out. However, we were delayed by the traps for a while and now we're not sure if she has left the compound or not."

"How?" Kakashi muttered in confusion. Everyone knew that the Uchiha Compound had hundreds of traps - both mechanical based and genjutsu-related - some of which Maiko had revived recently. No Anbu was stupid enough to step on one of those tricky genjutsu traps that block one's sense perceptions.

"Should we go in?" Tenzō inquired, "If we do, then the traps might take a while to get around and the chance of exposing our position is high."

"No, she has most likely already left. Expand your search to the surrounding areas while also keep an eye on the Uchiha Compound." The Sandaime ordered quickly as he stroke his forehead in slight exasperation. "It would save us a lot of trouble if she had miraculously decided to stay in the compound."

"Who's the one that triggered the trap?" Commander Nara called out to the Anbu agent before he could leave.

"Um, Mongoose."

"I see," the Nara answered without any emotion, "keep an eye out for that one."

Tenzō turned towards the Hokage one last time to ask for an order of dismissal before he stabbed himself and the shadow clone dispersed in an instant.

"If that's all, then may I leave?" Kakashi asked, already raising his nose to check for that whiff of scent. It was obvious that the Hokage had said all that he could. As for the rest, no one could promise anything.

"Yes, go keep her from doing something stupid."

Kakashi was about to do that until he felt a giant impulse of chakra coming from the village border.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

[Ten minutes ago]

You see, I never quite understood my brother's philosophy about the freedom of choice. Sometimes, I find his actions contradicting. Why do we choose between unfavourable choices and call it freedom? He didn't look like he was free, no, not at all. But then why would he still call it his own will?

Freedom of choice, what a joke.

" _But you see, Hime, it's not about the choices, it's about the state of mind. Once someone finds the courage to accept the consequences of their choosing, that's when they gain true freedom."_

Ah, damn it, even Shisui joined in.

" _Mai, your freedom should be something that you can be proud of. It isn't about the environment, it isn't about what forced you, it isn't about what pushed you. It is about why you chose it. I chose to go to Anbu not because it was the lesser of two evils between the options Father had offered but because I wanted to. Not you, not Father, not anyone but me."_

Right, so did you massacre the clan out of your free will? Was this the _state of mind_ that allowed you to see the bigger picture of peace rather than turn the blade towards Danzō, like what I would probably do if I were in your position?

Wait, I'm sorry, I meant that you chose this _state of mind_ , this outlook of pacifism, not the other way around.

" _Life is short for shinobi, and for those of us who were born in a clan, life is even more restrained. Life wouldn't be life if all we did was to evaluate the pros and cons of choices. This passiveness, it's not the same as peace, because all it brings is strife. When someone is pushed to the boundary, it was easy to blame it all on the other party and ignore the fact that they themselves also had a choice, a will."_

I supposed that it sort of made sense, maybe, just a bit.

" _I want to see you and Itachi raise the Uchiha Clan, not the way the elders want, but the way Itachi dreams of. He shines the brightest when he is free."_

Me too, Shisui. Me too.

This training ground, where I stood on - where the three of us would play and train until the sky darkened before we went out separate roads - I never noticed that it was this close to the village border. The sun had already peaked over the horizon, signifying the rise of another busy village day. Just one ravine and one wall, I could be out of the village.

I swear to Gods, when I broke out of the Hokage's office, I really wasn't planning to rage over Konoha like some mad man. I just thought that in the off chance where I couldn't help but destroy something, it would be better to do it somewhere other than the Hokage's tower. Say, wherever Danzō was, that seemed like a good place to start.

After a few rushed body flickers - how I managed to keep myself from crashing into walls with _that_ chakra control over _that_ speed was still a mystery - I realised that I had no idea where Danzō was, or even where he might be. In this war of information, I had already lost the battle.

I just … felt so angry. Angrier than I had ever felt before.

 _Oh, goddamn it, I was so childish._ I buried my face in my hands and then wiped away all the stray hairs harshly. My hands felt wet and I wasn't sure whether it was because of the sweat or the tears. So, according to the progression of children's temper, they throw a fit, run away … and after a few hours, they start to reflect on their temper tantrums, if they are smart.

Behind me was the prosperous village of Konoha. Somewhere inside this busy village, hid Danzō. But the moment that I decided to go for his head, there was a good chance that I would be foregoing my future in this village - pay the consequences, as they said. He was a respectable elder; I was the child of 'traitors'. He could afford to kill me first, then ask questions. I could not. This was the lawful society I lived in.

To my left, about half a village away was the Nara Compound. Somewhere in that fortress-like compound, was my brother. Konoha would never let him go, especially not at a time like this. Konoha was smart to realise that Sasuke was more effective than anything in the world to keep Itachi - and now, me - in check.

So, what now? _Priorities, focus on the priorities._

Danzō needed to die, even if it was purely based on survival instincts. Konoha with Danzō was no safer than a jungle full of missing-nin for Sasuke. What he did to me, what he did to my teammates was enough for him to be on my to-kill list. Trust me, very rarely, the list got personal. This was one of those cases.

But what would happen next? It was funny because I didn't actually know.

What was Danzō's role in the village? What was his role amongst the people of Konoha? How much power did he hold? What was his relation to other people? What was his influence over Konoha's economy, politics, military? …

I didn't know anything, and therefore, I could never be sure of the consequences that I would be facing even if I did manage to kill him. I just knew that there would be backlashes. Even a genin could understand that there were differences between killing a missing-nin and assassinating a village elder.

I supposed that I could always take a page from Itachi's book. Assassinate Danzō and leave the village, leaving a young Sasuke behind as I run and run from both Root and Konoha, making sure he was free from the consequences I would cause, creating a safer world for him to live in. After all, compared to leaving my fate - whatever that was - in the hands of some strangers that run the village, I might as well go out and decide the course of action myself.

As they said, the things we sacrifice for love.

But seriously, that sucked. I, as a selfish person, couldn't accept the consequence of losing everything; the sacrifice of being separated from Sasuke.

 _So what am I supposed to do now? What am I supposed to do with you, Itachi?_

Could the end really justify the mean? Slap on a label: it was all in the name of love (or replaced this word with whichever one you want), and could it really erase the three hundred sixteen bodies that I had to cremate?

 _Right now, the view beyond the village wall looks really good._ I thought as I dipped my foot slightly over the edge of the ravine, imagining what it would feel like if I could just take another step outside of the village, taking Sasuke with me, leaving all this mess behind, even just for a few hours …

"Wait! Mai-nee-chan! Don't do it!" Today, I had been way too agitated. So when I heard that abnormally loud voice behind me, I freaked out and flickered to the side.

It wasn't until I saw the abnormally bright colour of orange that I managed to stop in my track and returned to the cliff side just in time to grab onto a hood that was about to free-fall into the ravine. With a strong flick of the arm, I tossed the ball of orange back onto the land, a few metres away from the dangerous position I had been standing at.

"Ouch! Nee-chan, you didn't have to throw me this hard!" It took me an embarrassingly long moment to recognise that little ball of orange and blond as he rubbed his back and winced.

"What in the world are you doing, Naruto?" I asked, still dumbfounded, "How did you find me?"

"Teme said that you didn't pick him up yesterday night but he can't get out of Shikamaru's place. So I promised him that I would find you." The young boy scratched his head and faked an unwilling tone as if he had no choice but to agree. "As for how I found you, well, I went around all the training places you took me, you're bound to be in one of them. I got lucky on my third try, hehe."

It was true that I liked to take the two boys to more reclusive areas of the town for training, one because these areas posed more challenges of terrain for the purpose of fitness and two, if my brother happened to burn something, people rarely saw enough to know who to ask to pay for the damage.

But still, the sun was barely up a few minutes ago, and I would hate to think how long he had to run along the village, searching for someone who didn't want to be found.

"I'm sorry I startled you, just whatever you do, please don't jump, Nee-chan?" Naruto said with puppy eyes and when he got up, he was as energetic as before.

It took me a while to understand that he meant 'suicide' when he said 'jump'. Whatever gave him that idea …

"I'm not going to jump off a cliff," I explained immediately, "so just go back to Sasuke, okay?" I didn't feel like dealing with him right now, not when every look at him reminded me of Sasuke, whom I still needed to explain this whole shitty poem of our clan massacre to.

"Have you been crying, Nee-chan?" The little furball of orange suddenly appeared under my eyes. His own startling blue eyes bore into mine, and just like that, I could see every bit of the positive energy that flowed through.

"Perhaps," I answered with no elaboration. I stared at him, and he stared back. We stared at each other. It was awkward, and awkwardness never sat well with Naruto.

"Oh, look, I can make shadow clones now, even before Sasuke could." _Poof,_ another Naruto appeared in front of me. "See, one, two, three." The number of orange spots increased to four.

"Ok, I got it. Good job" I was hoping in vain that my broken sentences could stop the encroachment of an orange colony. "Seriously …" And they just kept on popping up left and right. "I mean it, stop it …" A few more appeared. "Naruto …"

"OK! I got your point! Stop multiplying for a second!" I yelled with all my might and finally, the cloud of orange stopped increasing in mass. "Honestly, I don't know what to do with you and I don't even know what you want." With a sigh, I sat down on the ground and waved my hand to signal the real Naruto to come and sit beside me. Happily, the cloud of orange dispersed and their leader hopped over.

"I don't want much, really. I think what I want is what you want and you want to go see Sasuke. Therefore, you really should go see him." Ouch, that went bullseye. No one could argue with that logic.

"It's complicated …" Well, that must be the worst excuse that had ever been invented in this world. Now I sounded like the Hokage, what a new low in my life.

"Nevermind that," I muttered quietly and directed the topic to something else. "So, how do you like Konoha." _Tell me, Naruto, because one day someone may come exploit your emotions just like they did with me._

"It's a nice place with some nice people - I mean, it's my home." As expected, I got a lighthearted response. The boy's voice stopped at the magical word of 'home' as if that was enough to express everything.

"Then what about Sasuke?" I asked again. You see, at this point, I wasn't even sure that I knew my little brother the best. No matter what had happened, my mind would always go back to that innocent five-year-old who would scream a whole day in excitement after making a successful fireball. Now that I realised I might have to make a life-changing decision for us, I was hesitating.

"Sasuke is a teme who never says what he wants. Even though he's always as prideful as a peacock, I can tell he enjoys competing with people more than winning. A few years ago, he looks like a jackass to everyone but really, as soon as he realised that no matter how jackass he gets, he won't be able to get rid of me and Shikamaru, who just really didn't care, he stopped deliberately being a jackass. Sometimes, I think what he's doing is really tiring, putting up a barrier all the time, that's like having to open your eyes when sleeping. So if hanging out with us can be less tiring, I think even his spite is worth it …"

Naruto went on and on for at least one more minute. If we took out the constant complaints about my brother's personality, the rest was actually a pretty accurate and detailed analysis. Perhaps it was his upbringing, but it seemed like the blond boy was especially sensitive about others.

The lighthearted blabbing was so out of place with this mist of sorrow I was supposed to be immersed in it made me want to laugh and cry at the same time. It was as if the air was less … desperate.

Desperate, that was the word I was looking for.

"Desperate people are the most stupid people but they are also the most dangerous kind," I muttered under my breath, couldn't remember who exactly it was that said it before, Shisui or Itachi.

Psychological warfare. I forgot about that and by the looks of it, Danzō had almost succeeded. When one was starving, they would eat almost anything. When one desperately needed the money, they would take the loan shark's offer without much thinking. I was so desperate to stop everything that had happened, to stop Danzō, that I would take any chances offered to me, regardless of the fairness of the offer.

Perhaps this was what my clanspeople and my brother had felt when they made those unbelievable choices. We were desperate, stupid and dangerous.

"What did you say?" Besides me, I heard Naruto's curious inquiry.

"Oh, nothing, just that when you grow up, really, really be careful of desperate people, they are absolutely crazy." I patted his hair as he gave me a strange look. However, I did feel like I was forgetting something and even the familiar, slightly sweet scent in the air was reminding me …

"We need to go." Without wasting any time, I gripped onto Naruto's hand and started to run in the direction of the Hokage's Tower.

"What? Why? Where are we going?" The confused voice asked as I scanned the area. _Yep, this scent in the air …_

"Anywhere but here," I answered absentmindedly and dragged him for a few steps. But then, after a few thoughts, I stopped and pulled Naruto close to me as I made a few hand seals. Immediately, a gust of wind spread out with us as the centre point.

I would admit, when I ran out here, I was half expecting Root to show up. In fact, I kind of wished they would, after all, an enemy you could see was always a better start than a bunch hiding in the dark.

But then, Naruto came like a shooting star that completely smashed the plan apart.

There was a fifty-fifty chance that Danzō would give up this perfect opportunity to ambush me because of Naruto - someone no sane person would dare to touch. But by the smell in the air, it seemed that he had chosen to spread a type of sleeping drug first.

This particular type was so weak that it would be useless for someone like me who had gone through the mandatory Anbu drug resistance course. But for Naruto, whose only defence was his passive chakra flow, it would knock him asleep for a while.

Adding to the problem was the fact that this kind could be dissipated quickly in most mediums - air, water, blood - therefore leaving little trace behind. To be fair, Anbu sometimes uses it on civilians to prevent them from stepping into a potential fight - it was a standard supply in Zebra's kit.

To my horror, before we could get far, the little boy fell with no warning and only at the last moment did I manage to catch him in my arms. The steady rhythm of breathing I was feeling indicated that Naruto's life wouldn't be endangered. I, on the other hand, was in quite a different situation.

"Get out, I know you're here," I shouted to the surrounding forest that was still wobbling from the wind release. Just like I had expected, a dozen shadows poured out of the forest and deeper into the forest, I could see a few more dozen chakra signals wavering lightly.

 _Danzō, you are playing a dangerous game, so confident that you could kill me and fix this mess before anything happens, aren't you?_ But then again, if he didn't catch this opportunity, once I returned to the Hokage Tower, he wouldn't be able to catch me alone this easily.

Life was a gamble. I was in the game, and so was Danzō. For some reason, that had just made me feel a lot better.

"Attempting to tamper and manipulate the power of the nine-tailed jinchūriki is punishable by death on sight. Put the jinchūriki hostage down." A voice sounded from an unknown origin since I was paying more attention to the entire layout of the ambush. But still, after knowing the truth behind the massacre, I felt the sensitivity and controversy of my identity more so than ever.

"Really? Using a little boy to threaten me, have you no sense of shame left?" I wasn't actually expecting an answer since the chit-chat was most definitely to stall for time. "Whatever, it won't be the first time."

Sixty, that would be the approximate number of fighters hidden in the dense forest around me, according to the visual details and chakra signatures that I had been gathering. Most of them were concentrated among the thick trees, leaving two open roads for me: the one to the populated area of the village and the one behind me towards the outside.

Something caught my attention as I laid my eyes towards the direction to the Hokage Tower. Behind all those damned branches, in the busiest district of Konoha, was a figure so vague that it seemed to shift with the wind. But I could see him as clear as any day because he stood out to me like a dirty old ink spot on a piece of flawless white paper.

He was there, he was right there, just taunting me. So close that it made me feel as if everything would be alright if he had just been dead.

Right, as if.

Still, prying my eyes off of that figure seemed to be the hardest thing in the world to do, so to relieve some of that desire, I lifted the boy into my cradle and tightened my arms around him. It was as if doing so would melt away the mist and allow me to think clearer.

The boy was heavy, much much heavier than the last time I had hugged them - Sasuke and him. _When was that?_ I asked myself. _A few years ago, until my brother claimed that he wasn't a child anymore._

But hey, like Naruto had helpfully pointed out, Sasuke never liked to voice out what he wanted.

When I drew my attention back to the forest again and started to go through all of my options, it seemed like everything was locked in time. Naruto was still sleeping like it was nobody's business, and the visible Root agents just stood there like statues, waiting to use one of the thousands of scripts that Danzō had written in correspondence to my next action.

Choice A: leave the nine-tail Jinchuriki. I was ninety-nine percent sure that nothing would happen to Naruto; he was just too valuable. But if I were in a test, this would be the first answer to cross out. It was simply a matter of principle.

Choice B: take the shortest path to the Hokage Tower by cutting through the streets. For species that live in darkness, light could be poisonous to them. By crossing out option A, I basically sentenced myself to a position that only allows defense. I couldn't run fast enough with Naruto, couldn't fight efficient enough, and couldn't even dodge fast enough. Yet, I had to make sure that not a cut, a scratch, or even a bump could touch him. Therefore, limiting the attacks from the enemy by adding the public exposure would be a sensible way of lessening my pressure and evening out the battlefield. After all, Root, like me, had gotten used to the darkness and withers in the spotlight.

But remember, Danzō was not living in the darkness, not completely. This fact had not been clear to me until only a few minutes ago.

At least half of him was not covered in black, instead, that half knew exactly what to do in the spotlight. He knew how to use the opinions of the public, manipulating what stories got told and exaggerating some while playing down others.

Frankly, based on the progression of history, this village inspired little confidence in their judgement when 'Uchiha', 'Sharingan', and 'Nine-tail' were put in the same picture.

To gamble the reaction of the public, it was like I had just arrived at a table of poker, facing an experienced opponent with deep pockets all the while not fully understanding the rules.

But look on the other side because, in comparison, choice C sounded like suicide.

Crossing the populated street was the fastest way but it wasn't the only way. Just like Konoha's name suggested, the entire village was in fact mostly surrounded by a strip of forest that lined the inside of the village fence and obscured one's view of the outside. Perfect for sneaking back to the Hokage Tower with a boy-sized luggage, wasn't it? I could say the same thing with setting up an ambush. The unseen was a natural habitat for both me and Root.

I didn't have a complete visual on all enemies, but I did know that if they had planned any ambush, it would be hidden among those trees. To make thing worse, by following the strip of forest around the village, the length of my already sad journey would be nearly doubled. For choice C, the fundamental question became whether or not I could actually survive at all - what a large amount to bet.

A, B, C, or perhaps there were D, E, F that I had failed to realise. All of them had their pros and cons and I could sit here all day analyse them and still not being able to drain every bit of information. But I suppose making a choice wasn't just about evaluating the pros and cons in order to see how sad and undesirable each option was. To make a choice was the declaration of responsibility, and the pros-cons chart was just a mean - just one method, and definitely not the only factor - to make the acceptance of responsibility easier.

"No pressure," I muttered in slight annoyance as I adjusted my grips so that the boy was held more securely in my arms. My pursuers almost twitched at my slight movement but I guessed that my action was not enough for them to predict the next course of action. So just to screw with them, I froze right away and returned the scene back to a tableau.

After exactly ten seconds, I took a large step back, feeling the edge of the cliff just behind my heels. Then, in all braveness, we fell down.

The ravine was only twenty metres high, thus, I did not get that feeling of falling forever. The forceful air current that brushed against my skin counted the short seconds I had left before I would crash and burn.

It was relieving and terrifying at the same time. Wisps of silver flowed out like the tail of a comet. Before anyone could be sure that it was forming anything concrete, the bottom of the river had already become a crater.

I blinked once, seeing the curtain of water splashing high up in the air. Everything was in slow motion as the water succumbed to gravity, fell, and rolled down the surface of the silver ribcage.

No time to waste, before my mind was even adjusted again, my body took action by rolling up and starting to run. The delayed attack came a few seconds later, but by then, I was already moving along the river, following the village border meticulously.

"And you are just going to sleep?" I raised an eyebrow at the figure in my arms, who was still sleeping despite the loud crash earlier. "Fine, keep on sleeping and see if I'm still alive when you wake up." As if answering me, I could even see signs of saliva on his cheek and that just made me more speechless. _Nevermind, I hope you can continue to sleep until this is all over because I really don't want you to see any of this. If I win this gamble, then you might have provided me with the card to break out of this dilemma._

The stone wall that made up the side of the ravine rumbled in a deep voice, signifying the arrival of the second wave of attacks. Rocks fell down in a landslide and landed right in front of me, blocking my path at the last second. Streams of fire followed my back closely, aiming for my head and legs.

I glimpsed at the edge of the ravine and saw one Root popping up after another, exposing themselves from their ambush sites. Well, they kind of had to, due to the geographical feature of the cliff. If they wanted to aim precisely, they had to stand close to the edge.

Facing the piles of rock in front me, I didn't stop. I didn't even flinch at the giant obstacle in front of me. Over the past three years, I had only used the silver giant - Susanoo, I supposed it was called - three times in total, and two out of three times, the duration only lasted for five seconds. I didn't know how much damage it could take, nor how long I could use it.

All I knew was that this was not some one-time explosion that would die as soon as it lit up the sky, leaving the rest of the night in darkness.

This was meant to last.

The silver skeleton plunged into the rocks and dust. I scrunched my brows at the slight halt of momentum; at this point, the fire jutsu hit the back of the ribcage but bounced off harmlessly. Clenching my teeth, the silver chakra pulsed and expanded audaciously until the entire upper half body with a head and two arms were formed and pushed apart all the rocks.

I thought to myself, after all of this was over, I wanted to hug him like this, lift him in my arms like this, just because he deserved the hug, just because he deserved the warmth, just because I hadn't done so in a while.

The Susanoo was still rising. After the bones were created, layers of muscle raced over the surface of the structure. Its eventual height was fixated at just two metres below the edge of the cliff.

The giant turned its head slightly upwards, towards the people who lined the ravine. It cocked its weirdly shaped head and stared with mockery, then, it brought up one of its arms and swiped down so very cheerfully.


	40. Chapter 40 - Pathos? Logos? Ethos?

Update 2/2

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Chapter 40 - Pathos? Logos? Ethos?

Kakashi didn't quite know the exact selection criteria for those assigned to in-village patrols but never before had he ever wished that they were all blind, deaf, and inept at sensing any chakra.

He could sense that earlier spike of chakra signal which had now dimmed like a consistent candle flame. But that was the problem: he had sensed it, not seen, or smelt, but sensed. He wasn't a sensor, so if he could sense that signature, it meant that Maiko was releasing chakra like crazy and the fact that no matter how inept the village patrol could potentially be, they could sense the abnormal output of chakra as well.

Just for accuracy's sake, Kakashi opened his Sharingan and immediately, a cloud of chakra dominated his vision, along with a bunch of messy spots that were too overwhelmed by the main one to figure out.

Thankfully, the speed of that giant cloud wasn't slowing down yet. It was following the village border meticulously, not showing any sign of wishing to step out or step closer to the centre. It wasn't hard to guess that her final destination was either the Anbu headquarters in the mountain or the Hokage Tower in front of the mountain - both completely achievable while travelling in the forest.

 _It seems that she isn't completely enraged like the Hokage and Commander Nara had predicted._ But it wasn't enough to keep everything a secret. He could already see the first team of village patrol heading straight for that part of the forest.

The Anbu team that Bear was leading should be approaching this particular situation of unknown details from the outside of the village border if they had gotten the message. The Hokage had explicitly stated that no publicity was allowed and that the presence of Anbu implicitly stated troubles which invited gossip. Therefore, Kakashi, who was not in his Anbu uniform, would need to deal with the patrol team.

After some thinking, he decided to make a shadow clone. One of him went off to meet the patrol team while the other took a side turn and headed off towards the forest.

Hayate, the leader of this particular patrol squad stared at Kakashi with his passionless eyes, and he could just feel the younger man's silent judgement at his determined stance to block their paths.

"Hatake-senpai, would you please let us pass?" Hayate asked, "We are just going to check the unusual presence of chakra like our job states."

"No." Kakashi smiled. "As for the unusual presence of chakra, that can be explained by a very common reason. The Uchiha girl is training, just trying out a special jutsu."

"Training?" Hayate's tone was very doubtful.

"Training," Kakashi confirmed, determined to sell that lame excuse that the Hokage had came up with.

"And the nature of this jutsu?" Hayate raised an eyebrow.

"Still in the experimental stage but as you can feel from the chakra presence, it's very powerful, hence why you shouldn't go near there."

"Why is her chakra signature moving?"

"Tell me, have you ever been in a battle where you get to stand still?" Kakashi kept up with his lines of bullshit. "Mobility and speed is a large part of the usefulness of a jutsu."

"Does Hokage-sama know of this, um, training that could potentially disturb the village?"

"Absolutely yes." _And if he didn't before, he most definitely does now because he came up with this excuse,_ Kakashi added in his head.

"But no prior warning was given to the patrol about the potential disturbance?"

"None of us expected that the release of this chakra would be attracting this much attention. It's a new jutsu, Hayate, she's having problems controlling it which is why she chose an isolated area with no population. And I'm here to keep an eye out for her unless of course, one of you have more experience with the Uchiha Sharingan." Kakashi was feeling a bit impatient as he could feel the chakra signature dimming little by little, and it wasn't just because of the fact that Maiko was speeding away from him. It would be quite problematic if another patrol had arrived before he could deal with them.

Hayate looked like he was in a great conflict with himself. Kakashi knew that he was a good person, and he genuinely felt kind of sorry for him by making his job harder. But sorry, Maiko's matters took precedence in terms of importance.

Before Kakashi would speak up again, a hawk arrived just in time. The bird flapped its wings before it finally landed on Hayate's arm, who wasted no time in retrieving the letter attached to the hawk's leg.

"Alright, the Hokage confirmed your claim. To be honest, I really don't want to deal with this. You two must have lots of trust for each other," Hayate commented, still using that dispassionate tone, and all Kakashi could do was smile along awkwardly.

"If I see any other patrols, I'll tell them to continue on their course and stay out of this area." Hayate nodded at him and he returned the courtesy. Kakashi waited, remaining as relaxed as he could until the patrol team was some distance away. Then the clone flickered away, running along the inner edge of the forest to intercept the arrival of any curious onlookers.

Meanwhile, the real Kakashi arrived at the foot of the mountain monument. He stared at some place far ahead in the forest. By now, she would have been forced to leave the ravine and move into the forest if she had wished to continue along the village border.

 _I have a few minutes, tops, before she arrives._ Perhaps Kakashi had more time because her speed was slowing down for quite a few times and the dimming of her chakra signature was definitely not just a part of his imagination. He could still see it with the Sharingan but as someone who was not a sensor, he could barely sense her presence despite the fact that she should be getting closer.

Kakashi didn't know how his clone was doing, therefore he debated between going directly to her and doing what he was doing now. But if she was using what he thought she was using, then him arriving might cause her more inconvenience than help.

So instead, Kakashi started pulling out all the wires, projectile weapons, explosive tags, oh, and smoke bombs he had swiped on his way out and started to lay the traps in a line.

He saw Maiko, or should he say, a silver rib cage just as he had finished his traps.

The silver chakra was wavering weakly, which suggested that the girl was running out of chakra to maintain the monstrosity. She looked like she was carrying something but the opaque shield around her was obstructing Kakashi's vision. Before he could get a better look, the silvery colour of her shield had become more concrete to fend off the fiery projectiles coming from behind.

Kakashi wanted to come out of his hiding place and help but he pushed back that desire and waited patiently. The waiting was almost unbearable as Maiko inched closer to his ambush. At the same time, the distance between her and her group of pursuers also shortened by the second.

As soon as she had crossed the line, Kakashi cut the wire. Then he regretted it almost immediately for setting off the trap too soon. The web of wires went up immediately, setting up a barricade that would cut anyone who ran into it into pieces. A rain of shuriken and kunai soon followed - some with explosive tags tied to them, some with smoke bombs attached.

The traps did spring up at right before the Root could cross that point, but some of the shockwaves of the explosion also hit Maiko and almost immediately, her last defence of the silver rib cage disintegrated.

Kakashi was about to catch her before she stumbled, that was until he saw exactly what it was in her arms.

So many thoughts ran through Kakashi's mind. _What the hell? How the hell? Why is Naruto here? What? How? Why? Oh, Gods, how the hell did he get caught up in this, why isn't he moving, what is that red coloured substance?_ Gods help him, he was freaking out beyond belief.

Kakashi had been suppressing the urge to see this, this precious being. _Naruto is better without him because shit happens around him, be it fate's decree or just angry shinobi whose friends he or his sensei had killed,_ he kept on telling himself. Too many memories or just too much responsibility, Kakashi had a thousand lame excuses on staying out of his life and nothing to prepare him for dealing with him personally.

When the smoke started to fill the area, Maiko was still running like nothing could break her out of her concentration. Kakashi rushed to that bright shade of orange as if it were the only thing he could see. Nothing else mattered.

He grabbed onto her arm, hard, and halted her mid track. She struggled at first, but she stopped immediately, perhaps because she had identified him. His hand was still gripping hard, digging into the thin layer of the sleeve. Funny, it was like he was doing something he would regret later big time but he couldn't control himself.

"Give him to me." Kakashi hissed as he practically robbed Naruto from Maiko's cradle, much harsher and threatening than he would have wanted. He placed his fingers on Naruto's neck, _still breathing._ The red substance was definitely blood, but not his. _Then whose?_

The isolated bubble burst and he looked up. The girl had a hand up, covering her eyes, but it didn't stop the blood from dripping down her cheeks. He could just see her choking down an 'I can explain everything' when she wiped away the blood on her face and shook it off of her hand.

She took a glance at the protruding tip of the Hokage Tower above all the smoke and dust, which reminded him that they still had a number of fake Anbu on the tail. _Oh no, bad idea, that path is way too direct and open,_ Kakashi noted as soon as he saw the girl heading off to the tower.

"This way." He pulled her along in the smoke towards an underground entrance to the Anbu Headquarter he had located earlier. Quickly, he pulled open the cover and tried to lead Maiko down, but she pushed his hand off violently and jumped down on her own.

Okay, he deserved that.

Perhaps the Anbu tunnel wasn't much safer considering that the agency was contaminated, but he could pull an alarm every five steps and the whole headquarter would be alerted. He was betting that the spies that got into Anbu wanted to stay undercover for a bit longer, but seeing what happened out there, he was starting to think that he valued Root way too much for their policy of secrecy.

The plan was to use the Anbu headquarters as a transfer station for the path that led to the Hokage's office. Kakashi locked the entrance and grabbed a cloak hanging on the wall and covered Naruto up nicely and neatly. It was going to look weird, but lots of weird things happen on Anbu missions.

Maiko stared at the wall for a moment and proceeded to grab a blank training mask off the hanger. Seeing the white training mask on her face was just so bizarre, considering her current position in Anbu, but Kakashi supposed that it was a better alternative than a blood stained face.

Every time an Anbu passed by Kakashi in the corridor, he felt his muscles tensing up. Everyone felt like a traitor that was going to slash a kunai at his head and it was making his nerves go haywire. Unconsciously, he started to move faster. He needed to get Naruto out of here, to somewhere safe that wasn't swarmed with potential unauthorised killers - assuming he could find one.

No, he had to find one. Konoha was supposed to be that place, but Danzō and Root were making that impossible.

"What the―why the hell is Naruto with you?" The Hokage exclaimed as soon as he saw the child under the cloak. Kakashi felt for the man, really. There were very few things that could make people like them turn off their rational circuit, and it looked like they all had their turns today.

"He kind of walked in on Root's Uchiha extermination mission," Maiko summarised impassively. It made him wonder if she was trying to be sarcastic in hiding her pent up anger. But nevertheless, a very succinct summary.

"What made him unconscious?" The Hokage asked. His eyes flashed dangerously for a second before he was sure that the steady breathing showed no signs of damaged health.

"Not me, if that's what you're wondering." There was something dangerously brave about the way Maiko responded to that. But clearly, the Hokage had more practice in the art of patience - or he was just feeling extra forgiving because of the guilt today - because the biggest reaction he gave was rolling his eyes.

However, Maiko was glaring at Kakashi when she finished the sentence, and that sent a shiver down his spine. Suddenly, something hit him: Maiko didn't know his close connection to Naruto. Her understanding stayed at the point where Naruto was just a weapon of mass destruction for the village that may or may not be controlled by the Sharingan. Therefore, it was more than likely that Maiko would take his harsh reaction as doubt and blame.

The Nara darted his gaze between the Hokage, Maiko, and Kakashi and decided that the drama was enough. "So, it was Root then, I take it?"

"They sprayed the sleeping drug over the area when they realised that Naruto was there. Standard Anbu issued, used for civilians, probably the newest type, so he should be waking up in twenty minutes or so." Just as Maiko was explaining, the boy on the couch stirred. "Nevermind, damn, he has a fast metabolism."

"How many Root members were there?" Commander Nara asked again, and this time, it was for both of them.

"I saw somewhere between twenty and thirty," Kakashi answered.

"There were at least fifty back at the ravine, but I punched some off the cliff or into the rocks," Maiko responded next. "So if you send people along the northeastern border, you might find some bodies along the way, that is, if you're quicker than the Root's clean up team. I heard they are quite efficient."

"I will start on that. Hokage-sama?" The Hokage gave the man a slight nod, but his attention was fixed on Naruto.

When the Jōnin Commander left the room, he said something to Maiko along the lines of "you might want to lay off some of that taunting" to which Maiko responded with a "working on it".

"I am going to deal with this first." The Hokage pointed at Naruto, who looked like he could be waking up any second and they did not have an adequate explanation for him. "We'll talk more when I get back, so please, I'm begging you, don't leave this room."

The Hokage stared at the girl until she finally nodded semi-sincerely, then he let out a breath and turned his attention to Kakashi. "Fill her in on the side-effects of assassinating a Konoha councilman in the village and the problems of Root. Just keep her occupied."

The office was soon cleared of anyone over thirty and under twelve. Maiko stared at the door for a while after it had been shut tight. Kakashi couldn't see her face, but he could see how she tightened her fists, released them, and tightened them again. Eventually, she turned around and all trace of emotion was gone from her face.

"So, what did you do to be downgraded to the babysitter job?" Okay, maybe not all traces emotions disappeared. But hey, who was Kakashi to judge on her anger management strategy, being bitchy was a better alternative to being murderous at this point.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

It was a simple conversation.

He talked, I listened. Sometimes he wondered if I was still listening, so I nodded to show that indeed I was. This was like an intervention where even though I was sure that they all had a good reason, but there was something innate that made me want to reject whatever was being shoved into my brain.

"Anything you want to ask?" That was the polite way of asking 'are you still listening?' and a forceful way of making me engaging in the conversation.

"You are basically saying that I can't do anything about Danzō because I'm an Uchiha?" I asked, it wasn't that hard to pick out one depressing piece of news from a bunch.

"Not when he has your clan's rebellion over your head and you have nothing," he answered. It turned out that the reality was much worse once the situation was focused upon. It was true that I didn't know about this before. I didn't major in politics, therefore these things didn't come like common sense for me. That, and the fact that I probably didn't think there was anything wrong with the Uchiha's actions.

"But you're so sure that you can get rid of Root," I said lightly. The clock had just turned past eight, I supposed that I wouldn't be able to show up for that appointment at the Intelligence Division.

"Root technically does not exist, so as long as Anbu keeps it in the dark, no one will bat an eye."

 _Couldn't I kill him because he ran an illegal organisation?_ I wanted to ask even if I had known the answer. It was kind of futile to equate Danzō with Root, controversial to my previous beliefs.

"I know what you are thinking, but no. The formation of Root was to do jobs that even Anbu couldn't do and in essence, what they do protects Konoha, according to Danzō and the rest of the council. 'Enough for a charge of insubordination, but not treason', that's what they'll say at the trial, be it his or yours. Besides, anyone involved in Konoha's government will want to silence you first before they let the news of Root get public, and that includes people running the fire country which is our prime source of income―wait, didn't I tell you this three times already?"

I shifted my glance from the ticking clock to the person beside me. "Well, try again, I think I need a bit more convincing."

"Don't get angry, I'm just the messenger," he defended immediately.

I stared into his eye, not sure of what to feel. My right arm still stung - not overwhelmingly painfully, but a constant, recurring sting that just wouldn't dull down. When he clawed Naruto out of my arms, for that one second, I just suddenly lost the motivation to even explain myself as if it wouldn't even matter.

I very rarely win a staring contest with Kakashi unless he thought surrendering was a less troublesome option. But this time, he avoided my gaze like the plague.

"We need to talk …" The door swung open at that exact moment and cut off Kakashi mid-sentence.

"You need more lessons in politics. How's the crash course going?" The Jōnin Commander continued without waiting for an answer. "Check the ravine, there was definitely blood but no bodies. As for the silver lining? There were no witnesses either."

I gave him a look that said 'you call that the silver lining?' but after some thinking, I supposed he was right.

"Just for the sake of a debrief, let me put it in a simpler way for your assassin mindset to understand. The only ways you are going to get what you want are secretly or legally, and this applies to anyone who wants to give it a shot, but this is especially important for you." He waved his finger between Kakashi and me, and eventually, it stopped pointing straight at me. "Now, if you're doing this secretly, Root is making that quite hard for you, so it'll be in your best interest to deal with Root first; if you are doing this legally, shutting down Root is beneficial to you as well. Root is Danzō's arms and legs, his army, witness, and information network; his secret missions work because he has Root and Root also holds first-hand information on all of his illegal activities. Once we have Root under our control, we will have the chance to isolate Danzō and have plenty of time to remove the seal and get the information to remove him from power for good."

He had a point, I had to admit. Out of all of us in this room, he was probably the only one not affected by the surge of subjective emotions towards this topic.

"Just out of curiosity, how's that identification seal coming alone because until that happens, you won't have a trustworthy army," I inquired, now knowing that this problem that I had wasn't just as simple as killing one person. Danzō and Root, they were the same, but they could be just as different. I didn't have the time or stamina to shave down Root one by one but the Hokage was supposed to have an army, so why not?

"The original seal is a piece of work, but it's tied to a less complicated invisibility seal. By reverse engineering a seal to undo the invisibility seal, the cursed seal will be activated forcibly. Nonetheless, it's only been a few hours, give it some time. I'm confident in Jiraiya's sealing ability, but let's be realistic." I frowned slightly at the Hokage's explanation. If my understanding was correct, then that meant the Hokage was planning to make the identification seal a binding seal as well. For any Root members that infiltrated Anbu, they would no doubt be sent into instant paralysis the moment they were discovered. Clever, I agreed, but that spoke a lot of uncertainty for Ryuu's fate.

"Questions? Concerns? Proposals?" The crisp words from Commander Nara pulled me out of my trance. It took me a while to realise that the questions were posed towards me.

"First of all, love the honesty running around here. Second, I'm guessing you're keeping this operation a secret until Anbu is clear, so you need a front for Danzō to focus his attention onto."

"You are pretty good at foiling his plans and keeping him running in circles." The Nara didn't deny my accusation, so I just shook my head lightly but didn't argue any further. Danzō was already coming after me like a shadow, causing a bit more trouble for him wouldn't add much to it.

"What are you going to do with Shisui's eye? I heard that the Sharingan is no longer in the Kekkei Genkai protection program." Oh, I could just hear the acid tone that was oozing out of my voice. If there was something that I could never get over, it was the fact that he took Shisui's eye, right here, in this village. I swear that even if I were to die, I would come back as a ghost somehow and take that eye back.

"You want it back, I assume?" Commander Nara asked as if he didn't hear my questionable tone.

"You finally believe me that Danzō snatched my cousin's eye?" I shot back instead of answering his question.

"Looking at everything, the probability is high," he replied before asking again, "The question is, what do you plan to do with it?"

"I want to destroy it, burn it, send it away with fire like I did with all the bodies of my clan members," I answered like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Then, I paused for a second before speaking up again. "Were you thinking of something different, all for Konoha's benefit?"

I wondered about that, I truly did. When I first heard the truth, my trust towards everything was undoubtedly at its lowest. It wouldn't be the first time that a shinobi village tried to utilise a power they couldn't control. Perhaps, a part of Danzō even thought that he was safekeeping that power for the sake of Konoha. I wouldn't know, but whatever excuse keeps him asleep at night, not sure how that excuse would hold up against death.

Upon hearing my suggestive tone, the Hokage laughed bitterly and shook his head. "My girl, for future reference, there are many things that don't have to be said out loud. The government behind a shinobi village is never going to be pretty, but it's a common rule that we don't talk about it with contempt." He raised his eyes to look at me as he continued as if trying to show me all the sincerity he had. "But no, after seeing what Danzō could have possibly done with that power, this power can tear Konoha apart from the inside if people ever got word of it."

"Either way, I want to help with the destruction of Root, and I also want Shisui's eye back. I think that's the least of what you can do considering the service Itachi has done for you and how we just agreed that these two things will benefit Konoha." I said all that without batting an eyelash. Some might consider it to be immoral to use my brother to guilt trip the Hokage into giving the Uchiha what they wanted, and frankly, if I made it too obvious or too unreasonable, it wouldn't work anyways. But nevertheless, Itachi started this whole charade with the intention of keeping Sasuke safe, and I would be damned if I didn't use his foundation to contribute to the goal.

"You want in on all the information about Root, which is reasonable, but how do I know you are not going to try to assassinate him on your own? You are a ticking time bomb as well, Maiko." The Jōnin Commander reminded _kindly_. I looked at him for a second, trying to decipher what he really thought of me. But from his calm and emotionless face, I couldn't find a thing, so I brought my attention back to the Hokage.

"Itachi and Shisui tried to forge a peace over the rift between the Uchihas and Konoha, and I'm trying, really trying to keep it up for them. But Danzō is smashing it apart and you know it, Hokage-sama." Pleading. Pleading should work, at least for someone who felt the guilt and loved peace. To a large degree, I meant what I said, if not completely. After all, we have at least two people in this room who could probably pick apart an Oscar level performance if they really wanted to. No point trying to conceal my emotions, in fact, if it was done well, it would work to my advantage.

I paused for a second to observe the Hokage's face go from a blank slate to a state of deep concentration before continuing my impromptu speech.

"So I returned to you, Hokage-sama, hoping that you would trust me over the common assumptions about the image of my clan. This is not about the Uchiha massacre, I can … understand that they were punished because of their treason. So yes, my clan is responsible for their suicidal decision, and I … don't blame the village. But in terms of security concerns and treason, you know it better than I do that Danzō's action is out of line. He thinks it's okay to drug a boy simply because he stood in the way of his sacred purge." I said the words choppily, trying to get past that barrier of anger and unfairness I had felt and would probably still feel for a long, long time.

"It sounds like to me that those words are very forced, and it doesn't sound like you mean it." Commander Nara narrowed his eyes on me, picking up quickly on my pauses and hesitations, and he wasn't wrong. He was a voice of reason, I supposed. His motivation seemed to be much more simple - no nostalgia or revenge of the old times, just a will to protect the village.

"That's because they are painful to say! It doesn't matter if my clan committed treason, they are still my clan; they are my family. My father and my mother, they repented before death because they didn't have a choice!" And now, I was definitely yelling. Sometimes, blood remained thicker than water. In this case, I was willing to let the water wash away the bloody carcases, but it didn't mean that the smell was any less pungent.

But my clan members were gone, dead; dust to dust, ashes to ashes. But the living? The living still had a chance. "Please, I'm doing this for my brothers because they still have a chance to live with the people they love."

I took their silence as a reluctant agreement.

"Now, if Danzō really has Kotoamatsukami, then we have a problem." _You think?_ I thought as Commander Nara moved onto the next topic as easily as checking off a list. "Based on the limited information that Shisui told us, it doesn't have the usual characteristics of a genjutsu. Just attempting to identify the jutsu will be a problem, let alone breaking out of its effect."

For a second, I genuinely thought that the quiet air meant that everyone was thinking hard on a solution, that was until all the stares were making me feel uncomfortable. I realised that they were looking at me, someone who claimed to have survived the technique, for advice.

"What, I fought it off with utter disgust," I said immediately and it earned me a whole lot of sighs.

"You were just lucky that your emotions happened to be the opposite of what was suggested. Imagine if he 'suggested' that you should go kill him for revenge when you ran out earlier, would you have been able to fight it off then?" Despite the fact that the Jōnin Commander sounded a lot like a teacher reprimanding a student, what he said made the cells in my body freeze. From the beginning, the Root leader had set up an elaborate trap for me so that without expending anything, I would walk onto a path of self-destruction. Now that I was forced to think about it, it was like I had taken a drunken stroll by the line of no return.

I shook my head slowly - a sign of recognition for my carelessness and my rashness - as the Jōnin Commander finished his advice: "Think about that the next time your IQ drops to zero."

 _But he didn't use Kotoamatsukami on me, even though that would have guaranteed the success of his plan. Which means that there's some other restricting factor in play, distance, cool down time …_ As Shisui's friend, I agreed that he was smart to hide the nature and weaknesses of his Mangekyou technique. But now that someone else was wrecking havoc using _his_ signature skill, I sort of wished that he left a bit more than the advice of "think really, really, I mean, really carefully before you act".

"Still, we need a way to confirm the existence of Sharingan while not alerting him." I heard the Hokage mutter in the background. When no one said anything for the next little while, I raised my hand.

"The eye was transplanted, just like Kakashi's eye. That means, he can't deactivate it, and it will continue to use a large chunk of his chakra. It will look like a chakra lighthouse for someone who can see it, or specifically, a Byakugan user." I couldn't tell if the Hokage thought the idea was dumb, or that me trying to drag yet another person into this was dumb, or something else was dumb because all he did was scrunch his brows until they were close enough to be seen as a unibrow.

Just then, Commander Nara leant over and whispered in the Hokage's ear. "It could work … we need a definitive proof … semi-valid reason … in case she attacks him … hates bloodline thievery … care less about the Uchiha Rebellion … raid … more sensors …" I could tell bits and pieces from reading his lips, which made me wonder what the point of whispering was anyways. I couldn't get everything, but I could pick out a good number of the important points.

The Uchiha and the Hyūga were rivals since the beginning of our bloodlines because we couldn't stop comparing which dōjutsu was better. But we also had a lot in common and one of the most basic rules of our survival that no amount of bribery and threats could bury was that our eyes should stay in our respective sockets.

 _You know I can read your lips, right?_ I wanted to suggest, but Kakashi (I almost forgot that he was here) tapped my arm gently and shook his head, telling me not to interrupt.

"I can summon Danzō to discuss the recent events, but he will know what the hell is up if he sees a Byakugan user. In addition, the privacy seal in the office prevents the Byakugan's vision." The Hokage responded back to his commander and that was when I raised my hand again.

"I might have a jutsu that can stop the target's perception of time and everything that happens in that time, which might solve your current issue," I suggested in a light voice. It wasn't hard to tell that the Hokage was still trying to make up his mind and I was willing to do a lot of things to provide that push.

"He will see your Mangekyou, Kannon Bosatsu requires the target to be in sight." Suddenly, Kakashi interjected from the side. A valid point he brought up, but not enough to stop me.

"Yeah, well, he already knows I'm emotionally unstable so seeing a flash of Mangekyou in a moment of rage shouldn't really surprise him. In fact, I'm pretty sure he's counting on it," I argued, but I knew this wasn't what the Hokage and the Jōnin Commander were worried about.

It was the fact that I had asked indirectly to be in the room while the private meeting with Danzō was happening that really concerned them. But really, trust goes both ways and it wasn't like they had a better choice.

"You're lucky, the Hyūga Clan Head is dropping off some clan documents today, which is due by the end of the month for all clans." Commander Nara really emphasised the due date for me and I mocked silently in my heart, _let's see if the Uchiha Clan still exists by the end of June._

He then warned: "It's your chance, so however you want to take it, think carefully." Knowing that pretending I didn't understand him wouldn't fool anyone, I nodded. Next, I turned my attention towards the Hokage.

"If Danzō does indeed have my cousin's Sharingan, what exactly are you planning to do with him, Hokage-sama?" I asked.

"I will make sure that he won't ever hold power again in this village. I promise that he won't have the ability to stir up trouble, ever again." His answer confused me greatly because it sounded like he was deliberately avoiding the inevitable. Perhaps a life in prison with all his chakra sealed was enough for my older brother in his goal of protecting us from harm, but I'd like to make sure that my enemy was dead.

Death had a certain tone of finality. In a sense, it trapped those it caught in a barrier that rendered their desire to interact with the living useless, for better or for worse.

"Even in light of all these? Even though he used Naruto like a tool and disregarded his safety?" _Yet you still don't have the heart to kill him?_ I pushed on.

"It's exactly because of all these reasons that I'm doing this." There was a certain taste of pain that shouldn't have leaked out as the Hokage said those words, but it did, and it also brought the man who was supposed to be revered as a legend down to the ground. Not a god, not a sinner, just a human.

Eventually, he said to me, "Keep trying, you've come a long way in persuading me to go this far. Keep trying, and you may just fully convince me."

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

The dark irises stared back at me, the redness flashing weakly for a second before it died down mockingly.

I punched the rim of the sink in frustration and the mirror shook dangerously. My Sharingan wasn't turning on properly, again. Except for this time, I knew exactly why: I was on the brink of chakra exhaustion.

A strand of hair fell messily in front of one eye, making the crimson tinge that covered the ends fully visible. Immediately, I turned on the tap and dabbed some water to wash away the remaining spots of blood.

My limbs felt like jello - weak, unreliable, and ready to collapse any moment - but I supposed that was what happened when you tried to use Susanoo for ten minutes straight. If it weren't for the steroid equivalent of chakra I somehow got into my system earlier, I seriously doubted that I could have even lasted that long. Of course, on the positive side, I learned how to use the giant in more detail than I ever had the chance to for the past three years.

How to use the giant's strength to provide acceleration, how to switch between partial expansion to full or vice versa for various purposes, and how to preserve chakra by only maintaining the basic defences. Oh, it turned out the basic version of Susanoo doesn't cover the bottom - hence all the annoying earth releases and water releases.

Things that I wanted to know before but never had the chance to know due to health concerns, things I wished I had known before I started on a run where all I could do was hold my defence for the majority of my journey …

 _It is interesting that to advance a jutsu, people have to learn from the experience. But in our case, the more experience we have, the closer we are to living a life of blindness,_ I thought with a bitter taste. What a conflicting existence we, the Uchiha, lived.

I took a deep breath and mentally reminded myself that I would not be fainting in the bathroom. Carefully, I combed all the stray strands back with my fingers and pulled all the hair into a ponytail before finally leaving the bathroom.

I went into the storage room next door, closed the door, and slipped between the shelves of packaged clothes, weapons, and supplies. The Hokage gave me his permission to raid the storage room, since he kind of just forbade me to leave the tower. Of course, I also didn't plan to leave this protection haven until at least enough of my chakra has regenerated.

I was in the middle of pulling out a jacket from the compacted shelf when I stopped my movements. A few seconds later, I stepped out of the cover. The door that I had just closed a minute ago but probably forgot to lock was suddenly left ajar.

"Already?" I asked the man leaning by the door who looked like he was having an inner turmoil about whether or not he could step in.

"No, Danzō is currently unreachable, God knows where he is or what he's doing." It took a while for Kakashi to get what exactly that was being asked, but the answer was what I had expected.

If Shimura Danzō had decided to stroll in now to respond to the Hokage's summon, then we'd have a problem. However, it looked like he understood the dire situation he was going to have to face after that little stunt he pulled with Naruto, therefore, he was taking his time to prepare himself.

I hummed in agreement and didn't think any more of it. I wasn't until I had already retreated between the shelves that I remembered, the door was still not closed.

"You can either come in or get out, but either way, please close the door," I called out to him with a sigh. Right now, the least I had was spare energy to waste, both emotionally and physically. I knew very well that a good atmosphere was crucial for the success of what we were trying to do here, or the Jōnin Commander wouldn't be trying so hard to be the calming voice of reason.

Kakashi thought about it and eventually, he stepped in and closed the door.

I watched him lock the door and fiddle around the doorframe until the privacy seal was suddenly layered over the room. _Useful, expensive, overkill,_ these words popped out of my brain as I continued my task of pulling out that jacket without disturbing the rest of the pile.

"So, about Naruto …" Kakashi started the conversation awkwardly and the volume went to mute after the first three words. I raised an eyebrow at him, not sure if he could see it with all the shelves.

"Yeah, how's he doing now?" To help him get this over with, I picked up the conversation. I had never seen him have any trouble finding what to say before. Picking up conversations, redirecting topics, brushing over facts, those were the things that he was supposed to be good at.

"He woke up already, the Hokage told him that he fell asleep in the forest and you had to leave after dropping him off. He believed it very easily." Upon hearing that, I smiled a bit. A ten-year-old child having to wake up before the sun was up and then having to run around the village, I wouldn't be surprised if he fell asleep even without the interference of the drugs.

"And? Please tell me that you didn't come here to tell me that nothing is happening." I prompted again, already feeling my nerves getting the better of me. God knows how much effort I have already put in just for the sake of staying awake, and hearing that somebody else got to sleep doesn't help. Talking with an indecisive Kakashi was taking up more brain cells than usual, and right now, all of my brain cells were occupied on something else.

"It's not what you think, my reaction earlier in the woods. Naruto is important to me and not the kind of 'important' in terms of being the Nine-tail Jinchūriki for the village." _Oh, now I remember what he's here for._ That little scene had been slowly slipping away from my mind, right up until he mentioned it.

"How do I put this, he is precious to me, just like Sasuke is to you. It's _that_ important, and that's why I was not prepared at all to meet him in the woods."

My first thought was, _what, come again?_

My second thought, _Oh._

"And you are worried that I might misunderstand." I finally caught on just as the jacket slipped out of the pile completely.

He nodded while letting out a small breath of relief as if he was worried I wouldn't catch on (I don't blame him, my IQ wasn't exactly in top shape today). "It doesn't excuse anything and you have every right to be angry, but if there's anything that we can learn from today is that misunderstandings kill."

"Yes, but more importantly, so does prejudice, discrimination, rumours, and slanders." I couldn't help but add to correct him. The Uchiha Massacre had been the result of so many things, misunderstandings definitely did not cover all of them.

"Those too, and right now, we can't afford any miscommunication or distrust among ourselves."

 _That's true,_ I thought, so I hummed in agreement as I walked out from behind the shelves. I supposed that my answer was too crisp that it almost made him frown. "I've done my fair share of yelling before thinking today, so I don't get to judge others for being impulsive."

It wasn't so much as anger, but more of a helplessness I had felt when he demanded Naruto back then. It reminded me of the possible reactions I would get if I had so much as decided to step out of the forest for an easier route. But now that I knew the reason - a much more acceptable reason - behind his panic, I couldn't even find a point to pick at, let alone still have the energy to be mad.

None of us were saints, we make mistakes. Knowing him, he would never make the same mistakes again.

But still, some things didn't quite add up. "You don't sound like you're lying - but who am I to assume that - so that begs the question of why I haven't seen you around Naruto, at all."

It was then that I saw a very familiar scene, much like when the Hokage was trying so hard to pull back a leaked secret, but because I had pushed past the duct tape, the secret exploded.

 _Hang on, if what he said was true, then Naruto might be a relative, or maybe a relative of someone he was close to. If genetic works the way I think it works, then the second option is more likely. If we take into consideration the difference in age and the fact that Naruto is officially being recorded as an orphan, then that person who connects them all is most likely the boy's siblings, parents …_ I shut the door to discovery right there and then. It wasn't my secret to discover, and I was never given an invitation in the first place to do so.

"Why do I have a feeling that what you just told me is something that shouldn't have been told?" I questioned weakly, suddenly having the urge to bash my head against the metal shelf.

"Well, I might have just given you a hint for an SS-rank secret, hence the privacy seal." The more nonchalant his tone was, the more uneasy I felt.

The thing about secrets? One wrong word is as good as the whole story when given to the right or the wrong person. Silently, we made an agreement. I was not going to journey to find the truth like I did with the Uchiha Massacre because everything I did could result in a potential leak. Instead, this exchange would forever remain and rot here. I wasn't worried that the truth would get lost. It was clear that at least one person could keep the record; it was simply not ready to be told yet.

 _By whose standards? Only the party that was involved in the making of the secret and knows the truth, so what about those affected by it but don't get the say,_ a small part of me contemplated. _But you are not part of any party of the sort, Naruto is,_ a bigger part of me stopped the discussion immediately. Whatever deep, internal discussion about the ethics of keeping secrets would have to wait until my current problem is resolved.

And the next step is … food.

 _I think I saw the boxes of biscuits somewhere on the third shelf, or was it the second?_ In the corner of my eyes, I could see that my visitor still hadn't left yet. I looked up for a moment as if asking what else did he need.

"Is it really okay to burn everything you have?" He asked vaguely.

 _Depends on what exactly you mean by that,_ I wanted to respond but instead, I replied, "My chakra is returning steadily, it will reach an adequate amount in a few hours." _If not, there's a box of soldier pills on the last shelf._

"You know that's not what I meant. I hope you have more reason to return than the fact that you don't know where to find Elder Shimura." Geez, wasn't that the question everyone was wondering today.

I didn't answer him right away, instead, I fixed my gaze on exactly where his Sharingan was supposed to be. _How painful was it when Shisui had his eye stolen?_ Must have been very painful, more painful than I could ever imagine. It was only after a while that I realised my gaze was making him feel uncomfortable.

"Relax, I don't go around and take other people's eyes. That's someone else's specialty." I shifted my eyes away and walked in between the second and third shelf.

"I'm a very greedy person, to be honest. There is so much that I don't want to lose - things that I want to hold on to no matter what, and I still can't see the line that needs to be crossed for me to let it all go. My home, my younger brother, my older brother, their happiness, my happiness … I once tried to rank them to see what I could let go of first. But then, I realised that they are all interconnected like a web, ripping one out would be like ripping everything into pieces and then trying to salvage what's left."

"My brother paid three hundred sixteen, no, three hundred seventeen lives so that he could salvage a home for us. If I just carelessly toss it away─if I lose it when he returns, that would be … I can't even find the word for it." My voice echoed through the shelves and around the room until it was uncertain who it was that the words were trying to convince.

"Yes, I do have a reason to return other than the fact that I still need his whereabouts as part of the preparation for an assassination, or anything for that matter. I'm going to try everything to keep the picture whole before anything else, so going Kamikaze-style is not high on my to-do list." There was a thin line between being patient and being cowardly; there was also a dangerous zone between being courageous and simply being uncaringly crazy. How to suppress one's flames while still be able to explode when needed was something I supposed I had to learn on the way while dealing with the problem at hand.

"Kami … Kamikaze?" _Oh right, that term became popular during World War II, my bad._

"Suicide bombers." I quickly explained and Kakashi let out an 'Ah' in understanding.

Suddenly, I remembered something that had been bugging me for quite some time, so I turned to Kakashi and asked, "Do me a favour, you know the location of the Naka Shrine, right?" He nodded. "There's a shelf down in the basement with a pile of scrolls, can you bring me all of them as well as the scroll in my apartment?"

If Danzō had a Sharingan, then all of the unexplainable shit that had happened would make sense. But it also meant that he had access to the basement of Naka Shrine and scrolls left by my ancestor for three years.

The fact that I had allowed Danzō to be more familiar with my clan's secrets than I was showed just how negligent I was with my job. But it wasn't too late, I still had the chance to become familiar with every piece of knowledge that Danzō had stolen along with the Sharingan.

"Sure. The scroll in your apartment is locked in Intelligence Division for evidence, but I'll bring them all as soon as possible." He was very quick to agree and I muttered a word of thanks.

"Be careful," I said as I waved him out.

"You too." He turned off the privacy seal, went out and shut the door.

I ran over to the door and fumbled near the door frame until I could feel the seal design under my finger that was still radiating the leftover chakra. Immediately, I placed the privacy seal back on as I locked the door tight.

Taking off the soaked shoes and socks I had on, I stepped onto the wooden floor with bare feet. The floor was cold, bordering on icy, so I laid the jacket I had taken out earlier on the ground and sat down, keeping my feet off the iciness.

For some reason, the phrase ' _Problems that can be solved with murders are not problems!'_ had been resonating in my head for some time now. It was an old phrase that was very popular amongst the mercenary killers, some even used it as their business logo. Killers for hire prayed for this phrase to be true, after all, what would be the point of our existence if it wasn't?

Perhaps it was this mindset that had carried over which influenced my choices in this life, but so far, I had been living the illusion that killing people doesn't have consequences. As 'Artemis', I had the protection of being nonexistent; as 'Rabbit', I had the protection from authority.

But now, I had neither. My name no longer belonged just to me. My responsibility no longer applied to just me alone. I represented my clan and my clan represented me. I represented my brother and the clan also represented him. Ties don't cut that easily, past influences don't disappear that quickly. And so far, I had not done enough for the Uchiha to be stripped of its old opinions and be renewed. Just by realising that, I couldn't help but tap my head as if trying to knock some sense into my skull.

"Wake up, you're not a gun that shoots at wherever the person next to you tells you to aim, not anymore," I muttered to myself, hoping to sear this into my mind. "Grow a damn brain, otherwise you won't even know how the hell you died, let alone how you got used."

* * *

A/N: so there was that, and this was how I felt when writing these two chapters: (╯°Д°)╯︵ ┻━┻. Anyway, I guess my point is that no one is perfect, everyone is subjected to the sway of emotions. But I supposed that one happy thing is that people are trying to find the best solution for the problem at hand, even Danzo, but their perception of how to solve thing can be very very different. I honestly think that the Hokage is not dumb, but the first time I saw the Manga, I was having a hard time understanding why he let so many things go, it was like he was blind to what's going on around him. However, while I was having a writer's block on this, I thought, perhaps that's just one of his personal qualities - forgiveness. It wasn't a bad thing, heroes do this all the time, it just shows that his sense of optimism hasn't been dwindled down to nothing yet. On the other hand, Danzo can be said to be the foil of the Hokage, to some extent. Honestly, I think he would be fine (AKA thriving with all the power) if it were any other age in history where things are much more vicious than the current situation in Konoha, it gives me a feeling that he's born in the wrong era whenever I wasn't too pissed with him. Anyway, that's the result of my character analysis essays.


	41. Chapter 41 - Trailblazer

First of all, I am so sorry for going missing. This chapter was supposed to be up before September but I didn't finish it. Then real life stuff kicked in, so to adjust for it, I took a break from this site. I had finally finished this during the winter break, so here it is.

Anyway, it's been a long time, a summary of the previous chapter: Danzo happened and stirred up craps for Maiko. Lots of truths were uncovered, the stress was overwhelming, emotions were running high. Maiko finally convinced the Hokage to do something providing that she would present proof that Danzo really did take Shisui's eye, and the Hokage convinced her to stay put for a moment and deal with Root first. That was seven in the morning, and this chapter was the rest of that crappy day.

Thank you all for the reviews and messages during my time of absence. I will definitely respond to those as much as I can for the next couple of days.

Beta'd by Alice J.

* * *

Chapter 41 - Trailblazer

"Okay, I know I've said it multiple times, but your priority is to protect yourselves. Upon the slightest sign of danger, go back to your dimension. Of course, I will be on the lookout as well, but when I give even the slightest sign, I really mean it," I said to the wolves loping beside me. Despite my emphasis on the word 'slightest' multiple times, all I got was a chuckle and a snort.

"Don't worry, we understand," Fuyuki reassured me, "we are the ones who finalised the plan with you, we understand the risks."

"I know, it's just that I don't want to leave you two with just …" I waved at myself "... this."

"But your other plan is idiotic. This is much better," Zansetsu cut in mercilessly. After a sigh from me and yet another chuckle from Fuyuki, he added, "we are not just your average fighters. We are summoning creatures that transcend time and space, and a good general should be efficient and comfortable with deploying her troops in the way that maximises all their abilities."

I nodded, knowing that it was the end of the discussion and he would chew my ears off if I blabbed any further.

It wasn't long before we took a turn and ventured into the western forest. I scanned the scenery in front of me: sparse seedlings popped up from the rather bare ground with wild grasses and low shrubs adorned the fields here and there. Immediately, I knew that this used to be a well-kept field, but was abandoned years ago and was left to its own pace of natural succession.

"Is this it?" Fuyuki asked quietly as she trotted next to me.

I looked down at the crooked square that was hidden among the grassland. A moment later, I raised my head and turned to my surroundings. Despite the covers of the wild plants, I could see signs of traps, all rusted and defused. Eventually, I responded, "Yeah, this is it."

"It could be nothing or it could be something, but either way, we've got nothing better," I said as I bent down to examine the entrance to the darkest operation in this village which was supposed to have been swept clean years ago.

I fished out an explosive tag from my pocket and pasted it on the lock. "Scatter," I warned before all of us flickered away and the bomb ignited.

The metal cover was blown off immediately and landed a few metres away from the hole. A moment later, we all converged back at the entrance, staring into the black hole below with uncertainty.

Then, without wasting another second, I jumped down.

"Oh look, they have a freaking bridge in an underground base. Why do I feel like they have more funding than Anbu?" I asked - not to anyone in particular - as I landed on the said bridge.

"Smell anything alive in here?" I asked my summons as I leaned on the bridge railings. There were five underground stories beneath, the size comparable to half of an Anbu base. It was amazing that they had managed to keep this alive underneath the bright appearance of a village I had lived in for fifteen years.

"Not currently, but the human scent is stale and faint, I would say about three days to a week old." Fuyuki's words made me snap my head up.

"Only three days? This place should have been abandoned for years, no one should have access to this place."

"Not according to my nose."

This time, I let out a laugh. It wasn't the best news in the world since it couldn't prove anything other than the fact that Danzō's Root had been here long past their expiration date. It wasn't useful, but it was reassuring to me.

No one could say what this … chaos I had determined to stir up would lead to, but for better or worse, things could not remain as they were. This rotten core had remained underground for too long and it was still expanding. Things needed to change and I was at least trying to change it.

Suddenly, I felt the floor beneath me shaking and immediately, I looked around for the source of the quake. Zansetsu howled ferociously and landed beside me with a thud. His claws were stretched, muscles flexed, and armours readied.

"They took the bait," he growled through gritted teeth. Immediately after that, a wall was blown open one level down, hurling chunks of metal right at us.

Wasting no time, I took out a kunai and hooked it around my finger. Before the smoke even cleared, I deflected a dozen shurikens as I took a few steps back to somewhere more stable than an old railing - only to discover that it wasn't very stable after all since three kunai wrapped with those familiar explosive tags landed right in the middle of the bridge.

"Fall back!" I yelled as I flickered to the end of the bridge. The blast flung me off the solid ground but fortunately, my landing was cushioned by a wall of warm soft furs. As I shook my head clear of the ringing sound from the explosion, I grasped onto the fur and adjusted myself to sit on Fuyuki's back. When I refocused my eyes again, the mid-section of the bridge was gone.

"Do you hear that?" Fuyuki whispered to me and like she said, I could still hear a series of rumbling sounds even though there were no visible blasts occurring. I pulled myself further up on her back and saw just in time that six people were running on the narrow corridor hanging off of each underground level. But they weren't coming at us; they were moving away, basically ignoring our existence.

 _They didn't take the bait. I'm not the one they want right now._

"They are disconnecting all the exits in this place," I muttered as I connected the dots. They were collapsing and sealing off all the openings whether in or out of this place. Finally, Root had decided to come back and finish what they were supposed to do years ago and it wasn't because the Hokage had ordered them to do so.

"Stop them if you can, but the discussed plan is still on," I ordered as a series of faraway explosions still resonated in the background. Quickly, I got off of Fuyuki's back and jumped onto the railing, eyeing the trail of six who had scattered on the levels below us.

 _You're not the only one with explosives_ , I thought as I shot a paper wrapped kunai, and it was successful in halting two of the black-cladded people. Without a second thought, I jumped down to the level below and landed on a roll.

Before I could even get up, the metallic flash I saw reminded me to whip the kunai straight up until it met with the tantō, leaving a scratching noise and a trail of sparks. I guided the tantō an inch to the left and let it strike the ground.

I reached out immediately, grabbing his wrist, pulled him down, and flipped him over. I got up as the Root agent landed on his back. Before I could make a further move, I could see, as if in slow motion, a thin wire reaching over my head, descending down to my neck.

I grabbed the wire with my hand, a sudden wave of irritation going through me. Ignoring the sharp string that was cutting into my gloves all the way to my flesh, I sent a jolt down my fingertips. The tension on the string lessoned, so I plunged the kunai behind me.

The feeling of pushing a blade into someone's flesh came a moment later. Before I could push it deeper, the figure behind me dropped the wire and flickered away. Now, I had a strong suspicion that the agent ran away not to escape the kunai but more to get out of the way of the fireball flying towards us.

With no hesitation, I grabbed onto the railing and swang down to the level below. Imagine the pleasant surprise when I managed to kick another agent in the chest and landed on Zansetsu.

"You better be following the plan if you have the nerve to stand on my back," Zansetsu warned as I bend down and smoothly inserted my blood-stained kunai into one of the holsters connected to a belt hidden inside of his armour.

"Of course," I muttered as I pulled out another kunai and launched myself upwards again to catch the person who shot a fireball at me.

Fuyuki was doing a fine job of delaying the advancement of the other agents, but that was all she could do. There were limited rocky materials inside of this base and since we still had no idea where they were heading, all they had to do was scatter to evade.

Meanwhile, I was this close to driving a kunai into someone's flesh. The strike of the elbow, then a duck and turn, followed by an upward swing of the kunai. The blade drew blood, I could smell it. However, the puff of smoke signalled the activation of a replacement jutsu. It was an instinctive hunch coupled with the sight of an ink-filled paper that forced me to react before my brain even fully registered the action.

I jumped off the railing using as much strength as I could while the blast chased me from behind. What followed was a three-stories-tall free fall before I managed to stick a shuriken tied with ninja wire between the railings two stories above me.

I formed a half tiger seal in a rush and managed to send off a grand fireball, but in less than a second, I felt the wire in my hand suddenly snap, cut by a projectile. The second free fall didn't last very long since I was picked up mid-air by Zansetsu before we landed on the bottommost level. Let's just say that his legs were more suitable for crash landings than my bones would ever be.

As I was sliding another used kunai into his hidden holster, I looked up and saw the aftermath of my fireball. It had crashed behind three agents who had been giving Fuyuki a hard time as she struggled to deal with them. The crash gave her just enough breathing room to disengage herself. I could see one of her paws being covered in blood, but probably not hers, given that one agent who had already gotten way past her had a nasty slash down his or her stomach. In fact, the bloodied agent opened a door hidden in the stone wall as all the others converged to that location from the left, up, and below.

He whispered: "Fuyuki's got one, I've got another. Now you just need two more, shouldn't take very long."

 _Good, because I can't do this for very long,_ I thought as I whistled, successfully catching Fuyuki's attention. She caught my eyes for a second before promptly disappearing. At the same time, Zansetsu jumped into the air and threw me off of his back, propelling me towards the two who had not gained any torn clothes or bloodied cuts.

I landed on the railing, ducking instantly before I could even secure my footing. The blade that sailed over my head took a sharp turn and almost sliced my hand off. Ignoring the unsteadiness, I reached out, grabbed the agent's wrist and slammed it on the railing.

I could hear the crunching sound of the bones breaking in the background as I threw the kunai aimed at the agent's chest but it was dodged swiftly. Just as the projectile scratched his skin and embedded itself on the wall, I held tight onto the railing and kneed him in the face with as much strength as possible.

Half of his body was hanging over the railing by the kick. Before he could gain his balance again, I landed on the ground and aimed a spinning kick at his neck, sending him tumbling over the railing.

I didn't have much time to celebrate the victory because I had to take a few steps back to lessen the blow when the other agent caught up and started to hack at me with a tantō. Immediately, I whipped out another kunai and started defending myself.

It was going well, I could see an opening right after I landed a good kick on the agent's rib. The problem came after when the previous one that I had kicked off the railing suddenly appeared like some kind of giant bird as he ascended while shooting wired shuriken at me.

A few were deflected, but half a dozen followed as they flew in front of my face, torso, legs as well as behind before getting stuck in the wall on my right. The wires were weaved through the iron bars making up the railings so when the agent ran away, he was also pulling the wires taut.

The web of wires was stretched in front of me and behind, trapping me in a cage where the glistening lines were sharper than they looked.

My priority was redirected again when I felt the chilling wind as a sharp blade penetrated the web. I raised my kunai to halt the blade that was dangerously approaching close to my eyes. Straightaway, I reached out with my other hand and slapped down on the agent's sword grip and pushed it right onto one of the wires.

I slid his wrist across the wire with brute force, leaving a trail of dripping blood on the silver wire. Though, props to the agent who ignored the pain and kicked me instead, forcing me to let go and defend myself.

I braced the kick with my arm guards, but my arms still felt like they could snap at any moment. However, it seemed like the agent didn't feel like hanging out with me because he flickered away at the first chance. Since Zansetsu had ditched the agents he was holding up in order to come to my aid, all of them except the one I was holding up disappeared into the exit.

Catching the moment when the agent's back was facing me, I pulled my bloodied kunai out of the wall and swiped another clean kunai on the section of wire covered in blood. I threw the kunai at Zansetsu who turned his body and allowed the kunai to slip through his armour. With a poof, he was gone. His job was done.

When I turned my attention to the exit again, I was just in time to see the blank mask that turned to face me one last time. An explosive tag landed next to my feet before the last agent disappeared.

 _Well, that could have ended in a more pleasant way_ ―bam!

The remaining feeling of being blown apart vibrated throughout my body. Instinctively, I grabbed onto the closest thing next to me - the rim of a cardboard box - to calm myself as I gasped for air and for a sense of reality.

I closed my eyes for a long time as I regained my composure and when I opened my eyes again, I found myself facing a pair of eyes filled with concern and scrutiny.

"I know that reaction. Where were you?" Kakashi asked, not wasting a single beat.

"I was at Root's old underground base before my shadow clone was blown up." I combed my hair back with my fingers and returned my gaze back to the scroll at hand. However, Kakashi snatched away the scroll without hesitation, displeased with my attempt at brushing this conversation off as small talk.

"Fine, I was just there checking it out in hopes of finding something relevant."

"Or hoping that they would find you," he added with much disapproval.

"It's not like we have much to go on at this point. Anything is something," I defended immediately. "I confirmed that they were still using that place and today while I was taking a tour, they came to seal off any pathways, probably in hopes of disconnecting the paths from that place to other unknown locations they have."

"I couldn't stop them with just a shadow clone and two summons," I said with a hint of dejection. Before Kakashi could make another comment, I continued, "However, I did get something else."

With a light nick on my thumb, I let the summoning circle span out on the floor. A moment later, my two wolf companions stood in front of me.

"Good to see you again, we haven't seen you for a whole minute!" Fuyuki said, still playfully sarcastic despite the dripping blood on her foreclaw.

"Good to see you, too," I said, grabbing a glove from one of the dozens of card boxes and wiped the blood off of her paw along with pieces of fabrics that got caught on her claws.

"Get your things off of me." I glared at Zansetsu and proceeded to walk to him after I dropped the bloodied glove on the table made out of card boxes between Kakashi and me.

"I need an explanation. Now," Kakashi demanded, quite reasonably in this current situation.

"Remember when you said that the tracking of Root's new base was not going well because we virtually have nothing except for Ryuu? Well, I got you some blood samples and fabric from six currently active Root agents. I know that they spend most of their time out of the sun like gophers, but they've got to leave the base, even just to go out for missions." I dropped the belt with four kunai and the bloody pieces of fabric that were stuck between Zansetsu's armours in front of Kakashi. I even picked the dullest kunai with all kinds of bumps on them so the fabrics would be caught on them, even though they were horrible projectiles.

I mouthed a 'thank you' to both of my companions before they vanished again. Then, I sat down again and closed my eyes for a second to calm the dizziness from such a large drain on my chakra reserve.

"It should help, right?" I asked, staring at him hopefully.

"Yes. If these agents are active enough, I should definitely be able to find something. I'll work on these as soon as Pakkun and the pack is back from their current search. Thanks." For once, he sounded uplifting and hopeful.

"But," his tone suddenly turned harsh, "how did you recover the chakra enough to pull this off? Shadow clone, summons and god knows what else. When I checked on you two hours ago, you said you didn't even have enough for the meeting." I was hoping that discussion wouldn't turn up, but I couldn't say it wasn't expected.

I stayed silent and shifted my eyes to anywhere but his. Kakashi didn't let up, though. He scanned the room until he set his sight on the jar of opened soldier pills in the corner and just like that, I could feel mild anger leaking out of him.

"Are you out of your damn mind? You do realise that you've just had an injection of soldier pills yesterday and now you're onto another box? Your heart could have stopped right on the spot due to overdosing on these stimulants." I could tell he was containing himself so that he wouldn't punch and subsequently break the makeshift table.

After the anger, it was the mockery. "What, the rules of life and death don't apply to you? Or do you plan to compare stamina with hundreds of Root agents and see who lasts longer? Go ahead, take the easy way out." He pointed at the box of soldier pill in the corner. "I guarantee you that you won't get the chance to take the fourth dose."

I fought the urge to shrink back and forced myself to look at his furious eyes, hoping that my sincerity was clearer this way. "I won't ever do it again. My mind wasn't in the right place." I paused and added after another thought, "I'm sorry for deciding this on my own."

I must have chosen my words right because the anger faded a little. "This is never happening again, remember what you promised. The card of desperation only works this one time and truthfully, it shouldn't even be an excuse at all." I heard him saying, "like you said, we are all very busy, therefore we can't be distracted by your health complications if they could be avoided."

"Absolutely," I answered immediately.

"I'm going way too soft on you with this one, but I just can't stay angry at you given …" he said while glaring at me with a sign of warning, "Anyway, go find a medic later when the crash comes and I hope it's memorable." With that, Kakashi returned his attention to the scrolls as if they were fascinating.

Ten minutes of silence was all that I could handle before the dead air drowned me. "Anything interesting in that scroll which you are intensely staring at?" I asked, testing the waters. I could totally understand if he didn't want to talk to me but there was no point boring himself over those painfully off-topic scrolls from my family's vault.

"This is apparently your family pedigree. Unfortunately, there's nothing interesting unless you count the fact that there were many second cousin marriages," he said blandly before picking up the scroll he took from me earlier, "and this is supposedly a map to a hidden treasure buried somewhere in the Thunder Country."

"Well, the date on that one can pretty much be considered prehistoric, so if my clan didn't recover that five generations ago, then I just might consider going on a treasure hunt once I'm penniless," I muttered. Just like that, I watched Kakashi dump it in one of the boxes marked "useless".

So far, we have three boxes of scrolls. About twenty were in the 'yet to read' pile, ten in the 'useless' pile, and precisely two in the 'might be useful' pile. One was the scroll on Mangekyou Sharingan and the other was the scroll detailing the construction and layout of the Naka Shrine in addition to the basement.

Somehow I had the feeling the shrine was more a place to store all of the out-of-date materials that just wouldn't fit in the compound. It was hard to discern any value Danzō would have for these scrolls aside from the two we had picked out.

"That genjutsu with delayed activation you were talking about, perhaps Danzō learned it elsewhere and it has nothing to do with your clan. There are infinite possibilities of jutsu in this world and Konoha only knows a portion of them, it's more likely if Danzō had found it through other sources." I listened to Kakashi talk as I grabbed another scroll from the 'yet to read' box. A moment later, he did the same.

We had established that Danzō could enter the Anbu facility for a chance to cast a genjutsu on Falcon. Anbu headquarters was a place of safety for us, it granted relief for Anbu agents, psychologically and physically. We were surrounded by countless safety measures and agents we had fought alongside with. Except that now I couldn't even say for sure that I could trust all of them.

It was plausible that Falcon was being tricked, therefore allowing Danzō the opportunity to cast a genjutsu on him. However, there was still a period of a few hours where he was in a crowded bar with many shinobi in the vicinity. Concluding that everyone in there was influenced by Danzō was going a bit far even for me.

The only thing I needed to connect the dots for that incidence was his knowledge of a proper genjutsu that could stay dormant for a few hours. So far, identifying that particular jutsu had been unsuccessful.

"I'm just proposing the possibility that it was simply something that Danzō had thrown out to sidetrack us. You're already through with the Uchiha's archive on Sharingan genjutsu and if this jutsu was found elsewhere, then the Jōnin Commander can treat this as a normal investigation with proper resources. You weren't able to assess the genjutsu properly with your chakra system so fucked up, but I assure you that it was easy to dispel." Kakashi's explanation was sound, logical, and based on experience. Yet, I just couldn't shake off the feeling that I would regret leaving this matter unattended if I didn't figure this out soon.

See, what happened with Ryuu, I could understand. However, what happened to Falcon, I couldn't.

"We have already devoted a lot of time on this, and by the looks of it, it's not going to end anytime soon. We are already extremely short on staff and we have to consider the possibility that Danzō wants us to waste time on the smokescreen." I stared at the unopened scroll in my hand as I processed his reasonings. It was true that these scrolls were a pain to read. The writings were hard to read, hardly ever in chronological order, and it wasn't like each one had an abstract for the summary. However, I still proceeded to open the next scroll and laid it down flat.

"I know, but in addition to that genjutsu, I'm also concerned with what he might use against me in the future, things he could have learned from the vault," I said, quite stubbornly, I imagined. "If you need to go take care of other strings of information, I'll be fine on my own."

"No, I'll stay here for a little longer," he said without missing a heartbeat. Then, he looked at the clock. "My packs probably need another twenty minutes to finish their current run. They are more effective in handling scents than I would ever be by a hundred times. To be fair, I was just there to fight off Root."

I raised an eyebrow at that statement. He definitely did more than just scaring off the Root agents, but there was no denying that the pack could handle it much better. Canines were just more talented in the olfactory department than humans.

"However, I do want to go revisit the old Root base. The tunnels may be collapsed but I might be able to dig up something before Danzō's seals block me of any chance of going further. We may not have complete tunnels, but the accessible parts may point us in a general direction of where to look next." Upon hearing Kakashi's plan, I nodded thoughtfully. After a pause, he added, "If his base is still close to Konoha, then there are only so many locations that he could have built at while evading all detections." Well then, it looked like sleep might be a luxury for us in the next few days. Without another word, we dived into the inspection of my family scrolls.

The silence didn't last very long and this time it was on me.

"You know, I've had quite some time to think about how I got where I am before you came here and joined me on the paperwork." I suddenly spoke up after flipping through three pages of ancient clan history. "The progression of events - mainly Danzō's aggression towards me - have been insane."

"He had a use for me yesterday. He wasn't planning to kill me, but after one unsuccessful recruitment to Root, he went batshit crazy. I'm sure he tried the same with you once upon a time, did he try to destroy your reputation, freedom, and any shred of sanity you had left?" I asked.

"Not to the same degree, and definitely not in the same time frame," Kakashi answered me after a pause.

"Exactly, he didn't need to go so far. If he had just left me alone then, I certainly wasn't free enough to go find trouble with someone so deeply involved in the government." At this point, I let out a mocking laugh. "He practically forced me to discover the truth, and I'm starting to think that it wasn't just because he's sadistic and wants to watch me struggle."

"So what are you thinking now?" Kakashi asked. After a period of silence, I spoke up again.

"I'm thinking he was afraid. Afraid that if he didn't act quickly enough, something bad will happen. Something worse than the trouble I'm causing him right now." I drew in a deep breath, letting the conviction replace the uncertainty in my voice and finally said, "I think he was afraid of someone, or something, but that was not me, nor the Hokage. In fact, I think that someone is not even in the village."

"Itachi. You think he is afraid of Itachi," Kakashi concluded. Bullseye.

"When he tried to recruit me, he emphasized my revenge and repeatedly reminded me that he could help me kill Itachi. I'm pretty sure that my existence to him before yesterday was a weapon that he could pit against my brother. Look at the whole picture, before yesterday, there were only five people who knew what really happened that night of the massacre as well as the cause. Itachi was the only one not in the village; the only one he couldn't control." Maybe because I've gotten a bit more excited to finally be able to string some of Danzō's possible motivations together, I stood up and started to pace the room.

"I wouldn't say that you can definitely kill him, but you do have a high probability of critically injuring him. Now, to keep up the appearance, Itachi would probably critically injure you as well, and Danzō only needs to clean up two injured Uchiha …" Suddenly, he paused and locked eyes with me. In that second, I felt like all my thoughts were exposed.

"But you already thought that part through, so what are you really considering right now?"

I sighed, knowing that nothing smelled more eager than an undying desire. "Do you think … do you think Danzō has obtained Itachi's location already?"

The air had gotten thick and still as the selfish desire broke through the facade of logic and reason.

"I don't know." That was the most honest answer I could have received. After that, he didn't tell me what I should or shouldn't do, didn't even warn me that it was a dangerous topic that could sidetrack everything we had been doing so far.

"And that's enough of me. We have plenty to deal with inside the village to be distracted by speculations." In the end, I was the one that forced myself to close the topic. Having finally remembered what I was doing before, I sat down again and started to move through the scroll.

"But, if I were the Jōnin Commander," I looked up in surprise when he suddenly spoke up, "I would tell you that the possibility of Itachi coming back has more uncertainties than the benefits at the moment. It would only serve to complicate things more than it would solve."

Oh right, Kakashi had to report back to the Hokage. He needed to relay back everything that had happened here, everything we had found, and everything we had discussed.

"I couldn't agree more. Like I said, it was merely speculations and I wasn't counting him in the equation anyway. I don't need him to save my ass, and I certainly don't have the time to sit and wait," I said, somehow feeling a bit more annoyed than I'd like to be. It was as if the thought of potentially seeing him again makes my own stomach twist in discomfort.

After that, I was determined to immerse myself in the wonderful world of 'prehistoric' Uchiha stories. It wasn't an easy job, but Kakashi didn't question anymore. It seemed that he already knew that it was one of those things where only I could figure it out. That and the fact that I would probably throw the next person who claimed that they could advise me on my family problems straight out of the window.

Twenty minutes later, Kakashi left after reuniting with his pack. I could tell he was still a bit angry but I did bring that upon myself. I promised him before that I wouldn't burn myself away recklessly, yet not even a day had passed and I had already thrown that to the back of my mind.

When it was around seven in the evening, Commander Nara finally came knocking on the door.

"He's here." Calmly, I followed him out of the storage room and locked the doors quietly.

When I returned to the Hokage's office, I saw the Hokage and the Head of the Hyūga Clan discussing something quietly. Technically, I saw 'Hyūga Hiashi' return to his compound an hour ago through the hallway window, but now, I could clearly confirm my earlier suspicion that the earlier 'him' was only a shadow clone sent home to create the outer appearance.

As soon as I walked in, the stoic Clan Head stared at me with an expression that was mixed with a lot of things. Silent judgements, disbelief, skepticism … It made me wonder to what extent the Hokage had told him about the lead-up to this event.

"You are setting foot in a dangerous place. It's not too late to back out." I turned my face slightly to see the stoic man with pearly white eyes standing beside me.

He was worried, I could tell that much. Not about me, but about the future of this village after what I had planned to do was done. Whether I won or not, the village was going to change, and he had to think about the position of his clan in this change. The only things driving him to agree to this was the Hokage's invites and the faint curiosity he had towards my outrageous claim.

"Thank you for agreeing to do this, Hyūga-dono. I am already inside the dangerous place now, so there is really no turning back," I answered and after that, the Hyūga Clan Head gave me one last look before disappearing into one of the hidden doors where the Anbu guards would normally hide behind. As soon as he was inside, it was as if his presence had disappeared. He had masked his chakra ever since I walked in, maybe even before that.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door and before the Hokage could say "Come in", the door had already swung open, allowing the entrance of the second character of this whole farce.

I could feel an overwhelmingly heavy aura expanding rapidly from the Hokage, covering the room in a split second. Everyone in the room could feel it, I guaranteed it, because the air was suddenly thicker and harder to breathe in as I stood rigidly beside the Hokage's desk. Whether he was doing it to further hide the Hyūga Clan Head's presence or to prevent the two of us from breaking into a fight at first sight, it worked.

The tension finally lessened when the Hokage tapped a button on his table, activating the most expensive, complicated privacy seal in this entire village. Now, we were isolated from the outside.

"Hiruzen, you wanted to see me." He was probably the only one in this village who dared to call the Hokage by his name in the presence of others. "What is the meaning of this."

"Danzō, sometimes, enough is enough. Yesterday's mess has gone too far, farther than what can be tolerated. It was a good thing that Maiko is willing to resolve this peacefully before any more damage is done. Therefore, I asked you to come here for a compromise: let bygones be bygones." As the Hokage explained the plan with firm words, Danzō laid his eye on me with such distrust and disdain. _Well, the feeling is mutual._

After a long assessment, I had no doubt that he had reached the conclusion that all of it was bullshit, at least, what the Hokage-sama had said about me. See, the nice thing about making the Hokage call the meeting was that his personality matched well with the fake topic of the meeting. Danzō, who had all the arrogance in the world, thought that he understood the Sandaime so well; that he could control him just by exploiting the Hokage's benevolence. He had every reason in the world to doubt me, but he had no reason to doubt the Hokage's intentions.

"I am under the impression that she had some very harsh opinions about me." Danzō's eye was still locked on me. This time, I was very aware of the hidden Sharingan under his bandage, staring at me, no staring through me, and it made my chest wrench in discomfort.

 _Try not be frazzled, try not to feel exposed, and most important of all, try not to rip his head off in front of the Hokage._

"She understands the risks and consequences, Danzō, and you should be able, too, considering you know more about the costs and benefits than anyone." The Hokage eyed both of us with harsh indifference. Danzō stayed silent for a while, not answering immediately.

 _Ah, now I could feel it, how unstable this balance of power was placed._ The obvious case of disrespect should be a clear sign. Before, no matter how much Danzō tried to shake this scale, to test the limits, the scale would seemingly return to normal as if it was the natural equilibrium. The Hokage didn't need to do anything except to spit out a few harsh warnings. However, was it really a natural progression because the Hokage's authority was absolute, or was it because Danzō was balancing it carefully?

It took me an embarrassingly long moment to break out of my train of thoughts and to realise that everyone in the room was looking at me. _Right, it was time for my act._ "Prove it to me that you can follow your end of the bargain," the Hokage seemed to say; "Let's see how much you can lie," the spider seemed to mock.

"Right. Elder Shimura, from Hokage-sama, I have understood the reason of your distrust, and I assure you that what happened before won't ever happen again." Oh, polite words might not hide my hatred and spite, but at least some part of it was true. It was only until halfway to the sentence that I realised that I was shaking ever so slightly, unable to keep the calm I promised myself I would have.

 _Oh, why the hell not,_ I thought, suddenly deciding to throw in the towel. It would work better for me. This would give him the impression that I was a dog on a leash - the Hokage's leash - because I needed protection more than anything. "So like Hokage-sama said, I wish that we can put this whole misunderstanding behind us, and none of us shall hinder each other again."

 _I am so sorry, Mom, Dad. I am so sorry that I have to say that._

"That shall be seen. What happened to all the spunk and fire you had when you refused the arrest?" He narrowed his eye and mocked me immediately. It took all I had to not burn him into oblivion with Amaterasu. It was tempting. So damn tempting.

"Hokage-sama has talked some sense into me. Besides, Elder Shimura, I don't want to cause any trouble, for you, or for my family. So I hope that whatever has happened over the last few days can cease." I hid my fist behind my back and dug my nails into my palm so that I could finish saying the self-degrading words sprouting from my mouth. It was a lie, a disgraceful lie, an undignified lie.

From Danzō's unimpressed expression, I would say that he knew it was a lie. I hope my emotions were selling; I hope he thought this was a necessary lie forced by my situation; or a lie solicited by the Hokage for the sake of my safety and the village peace.

He didn't need to believe me, that was not the point of this meeting. The point laid behind that hidden room.

"I hope you have better acting than that. What happened to the sincerity in that apology?"

 _Oh, you have got to be kidding me!_ A part of me screamed internally. Glad to see his goal of driving me crazy and murderous hadn't changed one bit. _Just go with the flow,_ the logical part of me chanted inside my head. This was the perfect timing, the perfect progression of rage.

I blinked, so suddenly, that it startled both Danzō and the Hokage alike. When I opened my eyes again, the tri-petaled flowers took over the dark irides. They locked so perfectly onto Danzō's slightly widened eye before the man in front of me froze immediately. Trapped, unable to harm others, so easy to kill.

So easy to kill.

"Now, Hokage-sama," I said immediately. I couldn't move my eyes because I would need all my attention on the target in front of us.

All around me, the privacy seal was suddenly released. Now, all of us were free to be surveyed. Despite the lack of any apparent motion in this room, I felt the skin-crawling sensation of being surveyed by the Byakugan so closely.

One second. Two seconds. Three seconds. Every moment felt so long. I wanted to ask so badly if he had seen it: The proof of Danzō's wrongdoing; the proof of my right to vengeance.

Vaguely, I heard a light, barely audible knock coming from the other side of the wall. Immediately, the Hokage reactivated the privacy seal and ordered me, "You can release the hold now."

I didn't.

Four seconds … five seconds … "Maiko, release the jutsu. We had a promise, and all of us are doing our part in it."

 _Yes, but a cooperation only works when both parties benefit. You can't blame me for not trusting you to complete your part of the bargain, because hell, I don't even know how you're going to do it._

Six seconds … and then, something snapped inside.

If one compared all the streams of chakra as strings connected throughout my body, then my web had just snapped.

Immediately, the hesitation stopped and I closed the jutsu. I whipped around so quickly until I was faced with the dark blinds covering the window. I blinked once to closed the Mangekyou and to hide that disappearing petal. My body was shaking, not of rage, but out of the feeling of illness and discomfort.

"That's enough! There's no need for this, Danzō. You got your proof, she resisted doing harm to you. You know as well as I do that her Clan's history is not the only thing that can't get out. Your actions this morning are outrageous, and I wouldn't be the only who thought that." I heard the Hokage say in the background, but with my back turned, the feeling of being scrutinized against was even more prominent.

"Calm down, Maiko," the Hokage warned.

"I am calm. Very calm," I said, biting each and every word as I turned around slowly. I was not calm, but for a very different reason than before.

I had no chakra left to do anything. I had carefully calculated my chakra expenditure so that I wouldn't be immediately exhausted after the meeting, but I ended up wasting more than I needed on Kannon Bosatsu because I had hesitated. Perhaps in hindsight, if everything worked, I would be grateful for this choice. But at this moment, I just felt angry and regretful for not doing anything when I could have.

"I do believe that this … misunderstanding can be solved. As long as you have learned your lesson from your clan's history; and from the past few days." _Is that a threat? That is a threat, and I have no doubt that he means it._

"What happened yesterday won't happen again, no matter whose hand it was by. That, I assure you, Hiruzen." He glared at me, or more exactly, my eyes one more time before he nodded to the Hokage and opened the door.

My eyes followed him until he was almost out of the frame. So unexpectedly, I saw the Danzō that was just talking to me turn into a puff of smoke.

"Did you see that?" I asked lightly, not trusting my vision right now.

"He sent a shadow clone," the Hokage confirmed. _This is when I pat myself for not hacking his head off earlier,_ I thought, _it's too bad you can't just charge him for being disrespectful._

I took a few steps back until I was leaning against the wall. The 'low' of that second dose of soldier pill had hit, and I was definitely not feeling so great right now.

"Hyūga-san, I believe it's time to tell me your findings." Upon hearing the Hokage's voice after a long pause, I turned around to face the Hyūga Clan Head stepping out of the hidden cell. I managed to lock my gaze onto that pair of Byakugan, those eyes that had seen the answer to all. _Tell me,_ I wanted to yell, _tell me what you have seen._ Hyūga Hiashi took a deep breath and finally, he spoke up.

"Hokage-sama, according to his post-war report, the right side of his body was greatly damaged from the right arm, up the shoulder, and all the way to his eye. Nothing should be running in those parts, and it was true up until the shoulder. However, in his right eye socket, I have indeed detected a very large amount of chakra flow, and it continued until it was abruptly stopped at the nodes in his right shoulder. It would have been impossible for chakra to pass through that tenketsu if his eye had really been damaged all those years ago like he had said, let alone this enormous amount. The chakra flow resembles Kakashi-kun's left eye. The only explanation I can think of for this unusual phenomenon was an eye transplantation. A Kekkei Genkai eye transplantation."

The Hokage leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes painfully. However, I let out a breath that I didn't even know I was holding.

 _Did you hear that, Shisui? Did you hear those words? After all these years; after all that you had done for me, I can finally give you justice._

Ah, I had never thought someone would get even close to Orochimaru on my personal list to kill, but apparently, Shimura Danzō just broke the record.

"Have I done enough 'convincing' for the day, Hokage-sama?" I asked lightly, waiting for an answer from the man who had promised and had the ability to give me the great support in the upcoming battle I planned to fight.

"Yes, Maiko-chan. I was wrong about Danzō, and therefore, I will take the blame for letting him commit this atrocity right before my eyes." _Yes, you should. You had all the warnings, yet you never acted on it._ This kind of betrayal doesn't disappear that easily, but he was not the one that I should be fighting right now.

"Hiashi, I ask you to keep this information quiet for the moment. There may come a time when I will ask you to disclose all that you've seen today to the public, so treat your memory with caution. Danzō― Shisui's Mangekyou Sharingan not only has great genjutsu powers, but it can also control others' minds." The Hokage warned the man about the dreadful abilities Danzō _stole_ from Shisui. I wasn't sure that just by knowing about the ability could protect one from its powers, but like all techniques, more information meant more precaution.

"I'm going to have to ask you to hide a little while longer while I send your shadow a message asking him to discuss something." The Hyūga Clan Head nodded respectfully, then he started to walk towards the door. However, before he was completely hidden, he paused and turned to the Hokage one last time.

"Hokage-sama, I am doing this because you had asked me, but the Hyūga Clan can only provide so much. I'm truly sorry for what happened with Uchiha Shisui," he glanced at me for a second, "but the Hyūga Clan won't be involved any further than this."

"I understand, Hiashi. I won't be asking for the unreasonable as well." The Hokage said with sincerity and the Hyūga Clan Head nodded once more before disappearing from the room again.

 _This is all great, can I leave now?_ I would like to walk back to my dingy little storage room before waiting out the painful backlash of the drug.

It was the reactivation of the privacy seal that stopped my plan. I turned to face the Hokage's solemn face and realised that he still wanted to discuss something. Then, I remembered.

"Any chance you are having doubts, second thoughts, random or maybe seemingly logical feelings of wanting to let him go and kill me instead?" I asked as quickly as possible, and when I saw the strange look he gave me, I pointed to my right eye and said, "Just making sure."

"No, not currently. Even if I do, I acknowledge that this is not just my decision alone and I've run the village long enough to know that one should always question a sudden change of mind before following through," the Hokage promised.

If one really wanted to claim an advantage about our Hokage's indecisiveness, it was the fact that he didn't take extreme actions easily. If my experiences had anything to tell, it was that it took a freakishly large amount of evidence and reason to convince our Hokage to step out of his neutral zone. I just hoped that this trait of his wouldn't change when up against Danzō's illusions.

"The shadow clone means we don't have his location right now, and I'm guessing you want him isolated when you do your raid?" I then asked, ignoring the discomfort that was swelling inside of me as much as I could. It was as if every single cell in my body were screaming, craving chakra like drug addicts.

"That's correct. It would be best if we could separate him from Root for as long as possible. I could do this again, but we need to make sure it was the real him that showed up."

For a moment, I just wanted to get this over with and I almost burst out "send him in and I'll plunge a knife into him to check". It was a good thing that I actually ran that through my head first.

"Can we talk about this later?" That's all I said because the current me was not capable of doing anything related to scheming. To be truthful, I doubted I looked very radiant and energetic right now.

The Hokage sighed and nodded in understanding. "There was one last quick thing, then you can go. It's about that Root spy on your team, I thought I should get your opinion before deciding what to do with him."

 _Really? I hate that topic as well,_ I thought in my head. "Do whatever you think is appropriate, he's out of my jurisdiction now," I answered instead. At this point, I think the Hokage clearly knew that I wanted to be out of this room as quickly as possible, so he let me go.

I pushed open the door, and immediately, I felt that the world was turning upside down. Quickly, I ran down the hall and turned the next corner I saw, hoping that it would lead me back to the storage room.

I felt like I was on the right path, but then again, every path in this tower looked pretty much the same and it was really hard to concentrate when it felt like my insides were being sucked dry.

This was what happened when one used up loads of chakra that didn't come by natural means. My body wasn't allowed enough time to recuperate on its own schedule, instead, my system of chakra production was forced to work over time. Now, it was dried up and decided to go on a strike and in response to that, my body, which had been spoiled by the chakra supply up until now, decided to protest as well.

The higher you reach, the more push you give it, the harder you fall. Now, my body was craving another pill, telling me to bring it to the cliff above water level to avoid the terrible feeling of being drowned. But I didn't need someone yelling at me to tell me that that was a no go. Another stimulation would make my system burst open and every harm I had managed to avoid on the second dose would definitely come if I caved in for the third.

 _Just have to wait it out,_ I thought in determination as I tried to figure out which door would lead me to my hideaway. _The third one to the left? Maybe the second one? Third or the second because I'd really hate to walk that extra distance to another door …_

"Easy there." Someone caught me and prevented me from sliding down the wall like some slime.

"Whoa, he really made you come here," I mumbled in awe when I realised it was Zebra. He put one of my arms around his shoulder and forced me to stand up and walk until we reached one of the doors on the left. The room had a hospital bed in it as well as a shelf for hanging the IV bags.

That was when I realised that I was not even in the right corridor.

"Well, glad you know it wasn't by choice," Zebra said in a monotone. "The danger of taking consecutive soldier pills - as we know since we all learned it on the first day of Anbu - lies in its 'high' and 'low'. Since you obviously got through the 'high', luckily, I'm here to help you through the 'low' - which would be a pretty abysmal 'low' if I got my information correct."

The sarcasm in his words was profound, but I didn't even have the energy to roll my eyes. Zebra pulled out a bag of IV from somewhere and hooked it up to the drips. After quickly checking to make sure it worked properly, he poked a needle into the back of my hand and attached it to the IV tubes.

"This is nutrient water, it will help you feel a tiny bit better, but not by much." As soon as he was done that, he made me lie on the bed.

"This, on the other hand, will make sure your chakra system returns to normal tomorrow morning," he said while his hands glowed a light shade of green. He hovered his hands over my chest - where the core of our chakra system lies - and allowed the warm medical chakra to comfort my overworked chakra nodes gently.

"I hope you are feeling horrible right now," he said, "and I hope you remember how horrible this feels so that you're never going to do this again."

"No, I won't," I said in a daze. He was right, this felt horrible.

"Was Wolf still mad? I really need him not to be mad at me right now," I asked, and after another pause, I added, "I mean, he said communication is the key."

"Good, you must be feeling really horrible because that sentence makes no sense," Zebra commented as he moved the medical chakra down my torso. "Actually, let me first ask you about something else." I turned my head slightly towards him and waited expectantly.

"He showed me your first medical record containing what he claimed was the first dose. I could tell that the component of that dose was not potent enough for an actual soldier pill. Is that why you decided that a second one was fine?"

I thought about it for a minute and answered, "I guess. I know I haven't been the most willing patient, but I do know what my body is feeling. After that first dose, the effect wasn't very prominent and the 'low' wasn't as bad as what I had felt previously. Nevertheless, it slowed my chakra recovery rate and I needed chakra badly."

There was only so much time the Hokage could ask the head of the Hyūga Clan to wait in the Tower, so the Hokage had issued a statement to Danzō to demand that he either came to see him by seven or he will send out Anbu to hunt him down. Danzō arrived as expected because he couldn't afford to let what had happened to go public.

It had been around five when I realised that I might not have enough chakra for the meeting. Even if I did, it would have been a close call and I hadn't been sure how long I would have to use Kannon Bosatsu for. The cost of chakra for every extra second would have increased exponentially.

So I took the pill, realised that I had more than I needed for the meeting and planned the tour to the old Root Base accordingly with my summons.

"I agree, the first dose wasn't potent enough and that's why you got away with the complications at the 'high' this time around." Zebra nodded, but I had a feeling that there was a 'but' and there was indeed. "But, did you consult with a medical professional? Because I would still tell you no because no one, not even a medic-nin like me can be sure of the line between 'not potent enough' and 'enough to kill you'. Be honest, was there another way to achieve your goal?"

I was silent for a moment and eventually, I nodded. I could have gone to the Hokage and asked for more time, and he may or may not have given it to me, but I guess we would never know now.

But you see, that was the problem. I could apologise to Kakashi in honesty, but I could not convince myself that my hate and mistrust for the Hokage was unjust.

"I remember the last time he was this mad at you was after our run-in with big bad Orochimaru," he said and I let out a frustrated sigh. Immediately, he objected, "Don't whine, I don't like that memory either but it's important, so let me finish." I swallowed my protest when the medical chakra suddenly became more intense for just a second.

"What occurred during that event was that you let your emotions get the best of you and that skewed your judgement and reasoning," he paused for a second, letting the words sink in.

A moment later, he said, "My conversation with you just now, it tells me something different. It tells me that your observations were keen and your reasoning was logical. Your judgement was definitely there, but even when you had other options, you just chose to evaluate your health and your life as something secondary. This is way scarier. "

"Now, when I said 'less costly', I don't actually know whether it was or not, but according to the reaction of our old captain, I'm guessing that the other option doesn't involve people dying or the world burning if you don't take another soldier pill."

As I stared into the green glow of the medical chakra in a daze, I realised that Zebra was waiting silently for some kind of response. "Oh, you wanted an answer for that?"

"No, it's fine, just leave me alone and let me imagine the worst." I just loved my teammate's sarcasm. They reminded me of the good old days, which was technically yesterday. Gosh, I thought this ordeal had been going on for ages.

"Well, I guess nobody would be dying and the world wouldn't be burning if I had found another way," I said tentatively. Then, after a second thought, I added, "At least not directly or immediately, according to my current knowledge."

"Great, I shouldn't have asked." With that being said, Zebra went back to the healing.

About five minutes later, he piped up again, "You asked me if he is still angry and I'm telling you: not anymore. It's more like he's frustrated, which happens a lot when dealing with you."

"What a convoluted way to answer my question," I couldn't help but comment.

"My point is, he's mad because he can't change how much value you put on your own life. I think I just gave you the solution to your communication problem."

"I didn't ask for one."

"Yes, you did. You said and I quote 'I really need him not to be mad at me right now'."

… "I don't sound that stupid."

"Yes, you do." I glared at him once before flopping my head back down onto the stiff mattress. Time to play 'I heard nothing", I supposed.

"I'll let you in on something though. If Wolf had reacted this way to you years ago, I might have called him hypocritical. Wolf was also handing out pieces of his lifespan as if they were sand grains. He was achieving the best of the results, of course, but the processes were not for the faint of heart."

"Those actions declined a bit with time since the post-war violence wasn't so prominent anymore, but I saw the greatest change when you joined - when he was forced to act like your mentor. What an interesting role model you picked. I'll let you figure out the rest."

I didn't need to. What Zebra was trying to say was already pretty clear to me.

In the room illuminated by the soothing green luminescence, I lost track of time. With nothing else to focus on, I could distinctly feel the symptoms being relieved. Zebra stopped the healing when he had felt that his medical chakra had done the best it could, and indeed, the pain had considerably lessened and I felt like I could finally think straight again.

Automatically, my mind went to the meeting, Danzō, the Hokage and all that jazz. It was like a pre-wired route had been programmed to direct all my available resources onto the Danzō problem.

Technically, forcing Danzō to come in real person was not impossible. The most direct solution would be for the Hokage to be more authoritative and pushy. After all, he was still the Hokage, if he had wanted, then he could very well hunt Danzō down or demand that he came for whatever excuse the Hokage could come up with. But the problem - probably the Hokage and the Jōnin Commander's biggest concern, was what to do after that.

The Hokage's image was built to be benevolent and fair and it worked, it gained him support from many. However, similarly, Danzō was popular as well with those who had a stronger view on the village's military development. Also, his story of rising from a small clan to such a high position made a popular figure within the numerous small clans in the village. He was also handling a lot of affairs between the village and the Fire Country Daimyō, making him a very valuable liaison with the Fire Country officials.

Without a proper excuse, detaining Danzō would be a highly controversial action. What made it even more so was the fact that the Hokage had to force him to injure himself or slap on a chakra restraining cuff on him to check if he was a shadow clone or not. Not only would the Hokage be getting an earful from the rest of the council, he would also be bombarded with questions from our prime customer - the Fire Country.

Perhaps, the Hokage could stall and stall until he had the proof for Danzō's involvement with Root and that the Root was doing treasonous activities. However, that could take an indefinite amount of time. Paper trail was unlikely to be left behind, and the people could only be cracked when the solution to the seals on their tongue was found. The worst-case scenario, the connection between Root and the treasonous activities was not strong enough. The Hokage had only known of Root's continued existence, as for who was running it … Well, I knew it, he knew it, but it wasn't definitive until we could get someone talking. After all, it wouldn't be the first case in history where a supposedly dead organization was revived by another leader and went wild.

If, in the rare case where Danzō had indeed pulled off some magical strategy and wiped himself clean of wrong deeds, then the Hokage's reputation and support would be damaged, maybe even beyond repair. This was, unfortunately, something I had to consider as well since he was technically my only protection umbrella in this village. Also, there was also the chance that the pressure from the council, clan heads, and the Fire Country got too much that the Hokage had to release Danzō before his raid could even begin.

We all wanted him under our custody so that whatever cleanup he had to do with Root could at least be minimized. But if the Hokage were to forcefully detain him, it would be his last option and he would do it right before the raid. This was to ensure that Danzō could interfere as little as possible and that the raid could finish and at least produce some results for the Hokage to continue detaining him until more evidence could be found. The Hokage knew that, and Danzō definitely knew as well. Perhaps that was why he was creating more roadblocks for Kakashi's tracking mission so that he could delay the raid as long as possible.

The Hokage's goal was determined upon the completion of Jiraiya's seal and Kakashi's tracking skill. Gave him time, he would definitely succeed. However, my goal was determined upon how much incriminating evidence that would result from the Root raid, and the more time Danzō could run free before the raid, the more chance of it all going to hell in lots of unexpected ways.

 _And the Hokage wonders why I'm so doubtful of his plan,_ I complained in my heart. With the amount of crap the Hokage and the Jōnin Commander had to deal with on a daily basis, I would probably be the only one who would try to solve this issue with all her heart.

Suddenly, I had a click in my mind. It wasn't a very promising idea at first glance, but it was a start and I had been thinking of doing it for a long time (okay, it had only been one day, but I felt it was longer). Before I could spring into motion though, Zebra immediately stopped me and prevented the IV tubes from being ripped out.

"Is rushing and running all you can do? Slow down, there's virtue in patience. At least wait until the IV is done." He stared at me accusingly and I muttered a 'sorry'. I had completely forgotten about the needle in my skin.

I was trying, really trying, not to rush things. Normally, an operation like this could take weeks, maybe days if it was urgent enough and had the resource. However, a normal situation would definitely include more than four people, two of which had very busy schedules. I knew that the solution was not going to come by in one day but the anxiety was driving me crazy, especially when it felt like I was the only one who could be screwed over by and actually cared about this factor of time.

"What time is it?" I asked. Zebra thought about it before motioning the number eight.

"Fine, how much chakra do you think I can get back in … let's say, seven hours?"

"Even with all my help, twenty percent, maybe twenty-five if you're lucky." I furrowed my eyebrows at that news. Normally, seven hours would guarantee at least sixty to seventy percent of the recovery, but I guess it was to be expected with the side effects. _Good enough._

"Wait, where the hell are you rushing off to again?" Zebra asked, clearly showing the disapproval of my inability to stay still.

"A very peaceful walk, there, you can report it back if you need to." I couldn't help but sound a little defensive. I hated to be paranoid about everyone, but I had to given what had happened with Ryuu and Falcon. Whichever way he was going to interpret that sentence, it was up to him.

Zebra was far from stupid, it took him a very short amount of time to detect the defensiveness. He took it very calmly because it was natural for us to take missions that were not for everyone's ears. A true comrade respected that.

"I don't need to do that." He pointed at the window and immediately, I realised what he had meant. _Unbelievable_. Yet, all he said was, "Trust me, I'm saving you from having another conversation," before leaving the room, probably with no intention of ever coming back.

With no other options, I let out a sigh. I should have noticed this earlier and I would have if I hadn't been so distracted. Also, whoever it might be, he did bring someone who was going to stick a needle in me. It wouldn't be him at all if he didn't take the responsibility to supervise this.

I grabbed the IV shelf and walked to the window and opened it without any hesitation. The sun hadn't completely fallen yet, and with the countless bright lights from the streets, it coated my entire view in a shade of light orange. I turned my head to the left and saw the lone figure sitting on the rim of the building. At that moment, I couldn't help but say, "Why did you go back to the old window creeping days? I thought you were over that phase."

Kakashi turned slowly until I could see his face with a raised eyebrow that told me he was not at all impressed. _A bad_ _conversation starter, got it._

"I need to go check on a friend before his work ends, but he's been assigned the night shift for the week. Root is withdrawing, you could feel it as well and twenty-five percent is enough for me to run away if anything were to happen." I explained, "Like usual, I need to start fixing another problem that has arisen. I just want this to be over with. It's only been one day, and I'm already whining like it's been a century," I muttered as I stared in the direction of the sunset. It was as if the sun was just stuck there, unable to move past the horizon.

Sure, there were countless reasons as to why I had wanted to rush this to the finish line, but the most important of all: I was so afraid to give Sasuke an answer. I, better than anyone, would know that the answer, the truth wasn't enough. I wanted a solution, and so would he. But currently, I had none, and I would continue to be afraid to look him in the eye until I did.

"Don't we all." His words seemed to melt into the background, fading along with the sunset.

"Anyway, there's that. So if I go missing, you'll know where to pick up the trail." After all, he was really good at that.

The sun wouldn't stay stuck. Soon, it would move past the horizon and prepare to rise again tomorrow morning. Despite my best efforts, time would continue to flow. Therefore, there was no reason for me to get stuck on this day as well.


	42. Chapter 42 - Treasure Hunt

Sorry for the long wait, but here is a super long chapter which is everything I have. Technically, this is more like one and a half chapter, but I don't want the next chapter to get too long but we'll see how it goes when the next chapter comes out. Depending on how things work, I might reorganise the content in this chapter and the next.

Alternatively, this chapter could be titled 'A Short Introduction to the History of Second Shinobi War' or 'The Inner Workings of Anbu', at least for some part of the chapter. Either way, the timeline here is messed up, I'll admit. I've never really figured out the timeline in the original series anyway, so please just bear with me and all my possibly incorrect time settings. If you are confused about the timeline setting, feel free to message me and I'll explain what I think happened.

Anyway, a huge thanks to my long-term beta Alice J for willing to do this for me after 4 months of nothing.

Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 42 - Treasure Hunt

"What. The. Hell. Happened!" I had to pull my yelling blond friend into a dark hallway before he could attract the attention of every single shinobi in the Intelligence Division. Obviously, he wasn't happy but before he could give me his piece, I covered his mouth.

"Shh! Lower your voice first," I whispered, warning him with my eyes as I removed my hand slowly, allowing him to speak again.

"What was that giant release of chakra yesterday? I could feel you going on a rampage all the way from here, and now the Northeastern forest has been quarantined without a proper explanation." I rolled my eyes at Shun's statement. He was exaggerating, I certainly did not go on a rampage. However, I supposed that my inner emotions were more intense than I would have liked and Shun was always excellent at picking out my hidden feelings just by the sheer familiarity he had with my chakra.

"God, you are not running away from Anbu, are you?" And he was raising his voice again. Immediately, I put my hand over his mouth again.

"For the last time, don't yell!" I hissed in a harsher voice, hoping that it would drive the message home. "No, of course I'm not arrested. Even then, I don't need my presence being announced to the whole bureau."

"Why are you here, Maiko? You disappeared for a day after that shenanigan at the Naka Shrine and now you just pop up behind me creepily. Please don't make me assume the worst that can come to my mind." Annoyed, he swatted my hand away and stared at me with those accusatory eyes he often used on 'unwilling information providers'. For a few seconds, we just stared at each other as the noises outside went on uninterrupted. Eventually, I sighed.

"Someone tried to frame and kill me, or is it kill and frame me … either way, the Northeastern forest is a wreck now. I'd rather nobody knows what happened, but obviously, my chakra was all over the place. So, I'm sorry but there are a lot of things in that forest that I - and the Hokage - thought would be best kept hidden from the village." _Which includes you._ I didn't need to say it out loud for the subtle message to reach him.

As soon as Naruto was involved, what I could say to Shun became 'nothing', no matter how easy it was for me to confide in him under normal circumstances. Besides, with Danzō, the Uchiha massacre/rebellion, and the Nine-tail all mixed together, he really did not need to step in on this matter more than he had already done so.

He stopped asking what happened yesterday morning but I could tell that the beginning of my reply was still raising questions in his mind.

He looked at me with a complex mix of emotions in his eyes, obviously with the incident at the shrine still fresh in his head. I waited, giving him time to accept that yes, something was going horribly wrong in my life, and it wasn't a misunderstanding that could just be fixed with a few words from the Hokage.

"Does Hokage-sama know that you are here?" He asked quietly before raising an eyebrow at me. "You look like you are drained of chakra. I'm surprised he let you out unaccompanied given what's happening."

"Yes, he gave me permission … unofficial ones, but close enough." Technically, I told Kakashi and he worked for the Hokage. So if the Hokage wanted me back, I would have been dragged back to the Tower ages ago. "I need access to the archive, legal access, I promise." I held up my hand to stop him from lashing out again.

"You need to tell me who wants you dead first," Shun demanded. I wanted to protest again but he just shook his head.

"You obviously know who it is with the way you acted back at Naka Shrine and you have no reason not to tell the Hokage if he is helping you. There are only so many people that can command Anbu-like shinobi in the village and also have the power to frame you so blatantly without immediate consequences. I'm going to find out who it is eventually, you might as well just tell me." He spoke in a calm manner as if he were merely chatting the daily news with me.

For a moment, I didn't know what to say. That ' _Trust me, you don't want to know'_ was stuck in my throat. The determination in his eyes told me that he had no qualms in fulfilling his promise of finding out the culprit, even if he knew the potential danger it may bring.

"I'll tell you who wants me dead later. Just not here, it's way too open." I bit my lower lip slightly in frustration of giving in. It would be better for me to answer his curiosity now than if he were to dwell any deeper. It would save us both the trouble, really.

"Fine," he agreed after a moment of contemplation. "The Archive room has the privacy seal, you can tell me in there. I will report to Hokage-sama after this of every document you touch. Are we clear?" He pointed a finger at me, and I nodded quickly. Just like Zebra had predicted, being left with only twenty-five percent of chakra recovery meant that the ill feeling in my body persisted, occasionally hitting me with waves of nausea. I just really, really wanted to get this over with.

Once again, we sneaked through the hallways like a pair of naughty children playing a game of treasure hunt, hoping that none of the adults would catch us.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

When I told him that it was Danzō who wanted to kill and frame me (yeah, I finally sorted out the order), Shun stayed silent near the door, probably trying to sort out his own schema breaking moment as I slid my fingers over the scrolls on the shelf.

I didn't tell him the truth behind the Uchiha Massacre, nor the fact that Danzō took Shisui's eye. I just told him that Danzō wanted to kill me to let his faction of Root remain a secret after he failed to recruit me. Those things were not quite ready to be public knowledge yet, and besides, the more I told Shun, the bigger the target would be on his back. Knowing about Root might not kill him, but knowing the truth behind the Uchiha Massacre definitely would.

"So what exactly are you looking for?" He asked hesitantly and I could feel his gaze following me as I waded through the stuffed shelves.

"Something to help us disband Root. You don't actually think that Hokage-sama would let that illegal organisation continue to exist after their little shows for the past two days, do you?" I answered without turning around, "Despite the fact that he shut his eyes regarding this matter for years before this." I said the last sentence so softly that not even Shun could hear the overflowing sarcasm.

"Maiko, I hate to break it to you but I have probably seen every archived document here at some point in my life, and I would probably remember if there were any evidence against one of the Konoha elders," he said to me, unimpressed.

"I don't need a nail in the coffin; I'll probably never find it. We just need to find a place a look ..." I muttered as I squinted my eyes at the bundled scrolls on the shelf. Reason number one why I needed someone from the Intelligence Division: I had no clue as to how these piles were organised. Just for the sake of experimentation, I pulled out one of the files. Immediately, stashes and piles fell to the ground, accompanied by loud noises.

"Yeah, I don't think that's the way you want to look for it," Shun mocked with a hint of laughter. With a muffled curse, I bent down in an attempt to pick up the scrolls. That was a bad idea, seeing that I just accidentally knocked more files off another nearby shelf. How could I have forgotten, the Archive room didn't even have the budget in terms of expansion. Instead, they just find new ways to cram things in here.

"Okay, just stop! Stand up slowly, Maiko, and don't touch anything." Following Shun's pained voice, I raised my body slowly. I saw Shun opening his eyes experimentally at the wreckage and wince. With a sigh, he walked towards me. However, instead of putting the fallen scrolls back to their shelf, he just piled up all the files on the ground and swept them to the side so that they could finally reveal a small path between the shelves.

"I'll deal with those later. Just hang tight and don't make my job any worse than it is," he muttered with a sigh before turning toward me. "Do you have a date, an event, or anything, for that matter."

Quietly, I gave him a date. It wasn't a very significant date on the public calendar but from Shun's furrowed eyebrows, I knew that he recognised its significance to me.

It was the date that Shisui had died.

"I'll be back." That was his only response as he disappeared between the packed shelves.

After a minute or so, he returned with a pile of files and placed them on the floor in front me. Without further ado, we sat down on the ground and started to pick apart the piles.

"There wasn't much on that day. Fifteen missions were completed, five C-rank missions and ten D-rank missions. The patrol reports were standard and there were no reported abnormalities. At eleven o'clock that night, the Konoha Police Department was notified of Uchiha Shisui's suicide and they only had the time to submit an initial report asking for investigation before …" _Before the clan massacre happened the next night,_ I finished Shun's sentence inside of my head.

"I assume that you want to see the suicide report?" He pulled a delicate file out of the bundle with ease and held it out in front of me.

I didn't take it. I wanted to tell him that I was over the past like he often urged me to do but I doubted that he would believe me. Even I wouldn't believe myself.

"No, can I see the village patrol reports please?" I said. He paused for a second in surprise before pulling out another one. He handed me the second file - slightly thicker and rougher in texture.

I didn't know if it was even possible to find anything out of the ordinary. Danzō was not stupid enough to leave any evidence lying around, especially if he attacked Shisui with Root agents. But I was grasping for any threads present, hoping that I could find any hint of a connectivity between the events.

 _I don't want to believe that something that tragic, that unfair, would just disappear like a flash of light. There has to be something left behind, some trails for me to follow._

"When was Shisui's estimated time of death?" I asked as I flipped through the boring report. Shun stared at me for a moment before looking down on the report in his hand.

"They never found the body but Itachi claimed that he committed the suicide around ten."

Sasuke said that Father usually left around nine, which meant that the meeting started around ten or eleven. Danzō would intercept Shisui on his way to the shrine, which made his operation last from nine to ten give or take. The timeline fitted with the logic but the problem was, there was no evidence to back it up other than the remaining Sharingan which could only be used as the last resort.

I looked down at the report of village patrol and gate watch, and just like Shun had said, nothing abnormal had happened. Between the time frame of eight to ten, there were no sightings of a sizable shinobi force, no sounds of fighting, and absolutely no signs of Root or Shisui mentioned.

"Are there any other reports made on that day after 2000, especially about any unusual marks left on the terrain?" I asked as I flipped through the village patrol statements again, making sure to look over each and every word in detail.

"Umm, the Uchiha Police Station submitted a report for their only search and rescue attempt to recover find any sign of Shisui, dead or alive. They might have mentions of the nearby areas." He sifted through the papers for a second before picking out a thick file. It was a photocopy of the original, no doubt. But even with the bleeding red colour gone, the small insignia of the Uchiha Fan still stared back at me tauntingly.

"What kind of marks are you looking for, exactly?" Shun asked all of a sudden.

"Dark purple marks, black perhaps. It should be quite visible, even if a few hours have passed." I said absentmindedly as I flipped through the police statements.

I still remembered the man with purple skin that had pursued me at the Shrine. Yesterday, while I was taking a stroll to the abandoned Root hideout, I passed by the side of the forest where I had emerged after the unfortunate chase from Naka Shrine. Along with the Northeastern forest, that region was sealed off by the Hokage as well. Still, the dark purple stain was clearly visible as it poured out from the forest, spilling into the sandy training ground.

The Jonin Commander told me it was a special kind of nano-bug from the Aburame Clan. Rinkaichū, it was called, and I should be glad that none it of had touched me. It looked like poisonous dry blood, to be honest. Apparently, those bugs die if they leave living flesh for a long period of time, so I wouldn't be surprised if the splash of purple blood was actually made of billions, if not trillions, of dead bugs.

Nobody who had adequate shinobi training would have missed that unless they had something to hide.

"Rinkaichū, seriously?" Shisui's eyes widened in surprise. See, with a skill as recognizable as that, one couldn't just walk off and pretend nothing had happened. Unless of course, they had an organisation behind to clean up the mess.

"What does that have to do with Shisui's death … Oh." He seemed to choke on his words, but I just kept flipping through the pages of the report without pausing to offer a more detailed explanation.

"The areas investigated in this report were not wide enough," I said abruptly after a brief examination of the report. My clan searched the potential area where Shisui's body might have ended up if he fell off the cliff. I wanted to know what happened along the path leading up to the cliff.

"Are there any other reports that might have inspected other areas, anything at all?" As soon as I finished saying that, a nauseating feeling reached my chest and I had to close my eyes to wait for it to pass. When I opened my eyes again, Shun was still scrunching his eyebrows and deep in thought.

I sighed and waved in front of his face, trying to draw his attention back to me and stop him from descending into the confusing spiral of possibilities like I had done.

"Shun, it's exactly like you've guessed, I think he had something to do with my cousin's death. But first, I need to find something that could even remotely suggest this possibility." I said to him as clearly as I could, hoping that it would stop his train of thought and direct it elsewhere.

I was already regretting saying as much as I did. It was a mistake, leaving so many clues for him like that. Because if he went any further, he might have discovered more than he should've, about things that I couldn't bear to ever tell.

A few hours ago, I had resented the Hokage for being so secretive about the truth behind the Uchiha Massacre and his adamant rule of keeping it buried forever. It wasn't fair, I had screamed in my head. But at this moment, I clearly realised that it wasn't just the world that wasn't ready to hear the truth. I wasn't even ready to let it out.

He returned his gaze to me and paused. He looked confused, unsure of what to reply. So I pleaded with him silently, telling him to just suspend his belief for one moment and let go of whatever strings of truth he might have thought he had grasped.

It was hard for him because thinking and analysing was embedded in his nature. Especially when it seemed that everything was so messy and confusing, sorting out the leads and making sense of the information was his way of keeping himself sane.

"The reports, right." He answered, still sounding slightly shaken. "I'm sorry, Maiko, the patrol reports were the only other source. The Uchiha Police Station had their own patrols and probably reports on that day as well but they were kept in the station." _And Danzō has access to all of them while I don't have anything._

"Besides, Aburame Torune, that Rinkaichū user, was twelve - or eleven - that year. Danzō might not even have sent him on a mission of this … calibre," Shun added, rather optimistically.

 _Twelve-year-olds can do a lot,_ I thought, _especially twelve-year-olds manufactured by Root._

Still, I had to admit, it was unlikely any of the reports would have left a trail anyway. Otherwise, my clan would have made a much bigger deal out of it. Or perhaps they had planned to, but they never got a chance.

"How long has he been Danzō's bodyguard anyway? He seemed way too loyal to him for someone from another clan." I asked instead. Out of everyone Danzō had in Root, his bodyguards were probably the only ones to have identities that could be traced - the only ones in Root that were explicitly linked to him.

The Hokage didn't have anything substantial enough that he could use on Danzō without exposing the Uchiha Massacre, and that included what happened to Shisui. While a charge relating to murder was definitely enough for the Hokage to detain Danzō for an indefinite amount of time but if the Hokage wanted to use that excuse, then he would need to provide a concrete link between Danzō and Shisui's death.

As per established, the only thing we had was the eye he stole. If Hokage were to reveal that, then Danzō would have no choice but to spill out everything about the Uchiha rebellion. I bet that if the Hokage were to detain Danzō, he would make a flashy scene that would get everyone's attention.

However, if the link wasn't about the eye and the Hokage could show that he had no idea about the eye, which should work if everything went smoothly yesterday, Danzō might not feel the need to spill out everything just yet.

After all, the Uchiha Rebellion was a double-edged sword for both of us. The rebellion, the massacre, the stolen Kekkei Genkai … while my clan was no doubt stained darker than it could ever be, Danzō was far from perfect and innocent himself. It was the last resort for Danzō. He wouldn't use it until absolutely necessary, be it to save his own guts or until I have done something horribly wrong to the village. For the purpose of keeping Danzō detained until the raid was over, just a link between his bodyguard and Shisui's death might be enough.

Whatever excuse the Hokage wanted to use, it had to satisfy a fine balance. Strong enough for the Hokage to drag it out as long as possible against all the pressure but weak enough that it gave off the possibility that Danzō could get out of it using only words.

Alas, it was all but a dream. I really shouldn't put too much hope into the idea that came to my mind while I was high on soldier pills. I had a feeling that if I were to bring this proposal to the Hokage, he would flat out tell me to stay away from provoking Danzō with anything Uchiha-related. It was just too risky before the Hokage could have more control over the narrative. Moreover, it would get even more complicated if the Aburame Clan got dragged into this.

"He's probably been sent to Elder Shimura since he was young. It wasn't uncommon for Konoha officials to recruit bodyguards from the clans. If Root were a legal division back then, the less powerful clans had no reason to decline." Shun explained in a sour tone. "It's part of our contribution to the village, implicitly agreed."

"The Aburame Clan is one of the four noble clans, I'd like to know which Clan could say 'no' if they were considered to be 'less powerful'," I said with a dry laugh. Aburame, Yamanaka … I wondered where else Danzō had collected soldiers from.

"I don't know what happened with the Aburame but the Hyūga Clan, for one, I don't think would have allowed it to happen. Of course, the Uchiha was another one." He gave me a quick glance that was anything but subtle.

I understood now, he was asking for confirmation. He thought that perhaps Danzō had tried the same thing with Shisui once upon a time as he had done with me. After all, given everything he knew, that seemed to be the most logical conclusion.

"Doesn't sound like he has given up, does it?" I said, basically confirming his speculation.

Maybe as an afterthought, Shun would realise how unlikely that was. For one, the circumstances were different. Back then, Root was still legal, therefore Danzō had very little incentive to kill Shisui even if he did indeed try to recruit him and failed to do so.

Maybe after tonight, he would realise that everything I had been telling him about Danzō's motive was full of omissions. Instead, my version of a story made Danzō sound like an overreacting control freak.

A control freak he might be but definitely not overreacting. He had chosen my most vulnerable time to strike but when I had regained my footing, he was waiting patiently. After years of walking that fine line with the Hokage, he had pretty much tested the limits as much as he could.

Except now, I would hope that the Hokage's limit was shrinking, and whatever frazzled him and his patience - be it Itachi or something else - would keep working its charm.

So for now, I led Shun on with the flawed explanation, and he was willing to be led. _I'm sorry, forgive my dishonesty, and please, just let it be for now._ Despite all my training, I couldn't make this lie work, couldn't get rid of the blatant flaws. _So please, stop asking me to find excuses as to why my clan was persecuted._

"What are you going to do now?" Shun asked, unsure of what to do with all the reports I had scattered all over the place.

"Accept that this is a dead end and move on, what else?" I didn't mean to sound so sardonic, after all, it wasn't as if I had never seen Root's efficiency. This was not the end of a world, I supposed. Nobody had claimed the job of trying to find Danzō yet, I could always volunteer. As for whether or not sneaking into the Shimura Compound was a good idea with my current position, that was a different story.

For a few moments, we just sat there in silence. Shun opened his mouth and closed it as if he couldn't figure out if he should make a sound. As for me, I was just trying to push down the queasy feeling that was travelling up and down in my body.

The dreadful tranquillity continued, until some loud screech from the hallway leaked through the walls.

"Let me go! I will tell you nothing!" I tilted my head at the loud scream that was followed by muffled banging sounds.

"An 'unwilling information provider'?" I questioned and Shun just shrugged.

"It happens once in a while. Let me check what's going on." Quietly, he exited the room, leaving it slightly ajar. I could see the silhouette of a shinobi shaking his head at the newest nuisance in the building before Shun walked up to him and inquired in a whisper.

"You're dreaming if you think you can get anything about our village and our leader!" That was the last thing he screamed before I heard another loud bang, signifying a blunt force trauma.

However, just as I was about to pass it off as some distraction, the replay of his voice struck a chord in my mind. There was something familiar about a certain aspect of his voice, that seemed to trigger something far away.

" _... I'll gouge your eyes out and present it to our Leader-sama, then I will be promoted! …"_

Suddenly, a piece of memory flashed in front of my eyes and I immediately snapped my head towards the door. The sound of his voice was different so the accent was faint but the resemblance was more or less there. Moreso, it was the same feverish emotion in his voice, a mix of respect and blind belief that somehow bordered on mania which had been seared into my mind so clearly.

Just then, Shun came back. Lightly, he locked the doors and told me: "A shinobi from Amegakure, they found him wandering around the Northern village border. They are trying to probe him for information since it has been years since we have managed to capture one of them. Despite how loud and obnoxious he is, his mind was actually quite hard to penetrate with normal jutsu, so they are taking him to the holding for a deeper probe."

"How do you know he's from Amegakure if we don't have a lot of current information?" I asked, sounding more restless than usual. Amegakure was the definition of a hermit. The village size was small and the shinobi size was even tinier. Immigration and emigration were basically non-existent. Nobody wanted to touch Amegakure because of Hanzō the Salamander but at the same time, they kept to themselves and rarely provoked other villages.

Our info about Amegakure was pretty much all collected during border inspections. On one hand, it was hard to establish long-term spies in there, as proven by numerous attempts years ago. On the other hand, they didn't stir up much trouble ever since Hanzō made sure Amegakure was free from the ambitions of the larger countries. Compared to the other major villages, or even small villages around them, Amegakure was the perfect citizen, and our spies could probably be much better sent elsewhere.

"He had a piece of paper insignia on him - Hanzō the Salamander. That hasn't changed since the Second Shinobi War."

Right, the Second Shinobi War, that was the last time Konoha had ever had major contact with Amegakure. As soon as Hanzō had defeated the Sannin and sent out the message 'don't touch Amegakure', they pulled out of the war and the other major countries just decided to fight on the lands of some other unfortunate small countries.

That was almost a generation earlier than the ones of Yamanaka Inoichi.

Accents were hard to describe, emotions even more so. It was like one of those things you would only know if you had experienced it. Even if Inoichi-san had looked through my memories, there was a limit to what was actually transmitted. He would have to be really familiar with Amegakure to find the link purely by the psychotic cries I had heard on the verge of death.

Besides, Kumogakure had been pulling the same kind of trick in Kiri just a few months prior when Kiri was still falling apart and hanging Kekkei Genkai users out to dry. Blaming it on Kumo was the most likely conclusion. Of course, when Kumo decided to try and kidnap the Hyūga Clan Heiress two years later, it definitely didn't help with their reputation.

"Hey, Shun, remember that time when my brother was almost kidnapped by some foreign shinobi and they had almost gouged my eyes out? Want to guess what their accent sounded like?" I asked with a dry laugh.

"Amegakure? The Amegakure who had never so much as had a skirmish with Konoha's border patrol in the past decade?" Shun said with disbelief.

"I can't say for a hundred percent but It wasn't just the accent. Rather, when they addressed their leader, the blind devotion was uncanny. It was as if they were addressing their saviour that saved them from hell." I supposed that it wasn't farfetched to call Hanzō that. If not for him, with how the war had been raging on between Suna, Iwa, and Konoha, Amegakure might as well exist as a complete wasteland today.

Shun was about to say something again but before any voice could come out, a muffled explosion filled our eardrums.

Immediately, the training took over. I pulled out the tantō and Shun hooked a kunai over his finger. We could hear the footsteps filling the corridor with clear and organized orders being shouted over the commotion.

Shun looked at me and I nodded lightly, then he opened the door slowly, making sure not to draw any extra attention. Immediately, I could smell the faint scent of objects burning and underneath that, the metallic scent of blood.

I followed Shun out of the door, hiding my presence so that I could blend in with the first responders.

"... You two, inform the Hokage. You three, get the medic-nin. The rest of you, secure the building and check everyone's identity." Inoichi-san was giving out the orders without a pause. He didn't look hurt by what I had assumed to be an explosion, however, I couldn't say the same about the two shinobi by his feet. One of them was painted red in blood but he was still in a better shape compared to the disfigured woman on the ground. Behind them, the door to the interrogation room was wide open and the metal surface was covered with blackened burns and splatters of blood.

As people rushed passed us, Shun grabbed my arm and brought me along to Inoichi-san.

"Shishou." The older Yamanaka snapped his head around when he heard Shun's voice. Meanwhile, I was able to step out from behind Shun and take a look at what had happened inside the interrogation unit.

The man on the chair was missing a torso.

"Where did you come from? I thought you left after the shift. Otherwise, I would have called you to help before this happened." Inoichi-san pointed at the grotesque scene in the room.

Then, he laid his eyes on me and scowled. "Shun, why is she here? What were you guys doing?" He gave us an accusing look and Shun visibly shrank a little. I guessed that Shun's shadow clone yesterday didn't get past Inoichi-san's attention after all.

"Did the Ame-nin blow himself up?" I asked instead, shifting my eyes from the dead man to the injured shinobi - Correction, one injured and one dead shinobi. The woman lying on the ground no longer had movement in her chest, and the man kneeling above her closed his eyes painfully.

"Yes—wait, how did you know he was from Amegakure? How long have you been here?"

"Where did the suicide bomb come from? He couldn't have attached explosive tags on himself, and his chakra must be sealed." I muttered in confusion but the most important question was, why now?

He came here with a highly recognizable insignia - no spy would ever do that. That meant whatever he was here for required his identity to be recognized. Most likely, he came here with the instruction of finding someone and showing them the insignia to gain their trust.

If I were him and I had a suicide bomb which I could activate even with restricted movement and chakra, I would blow myself up as well as the insignia to make sure nothing was leaked.

"Takeda, the medic will be here soon, do you feel well enough to tell me what happened?" Inoichi-san knelt down as well and steadied the injured man. With multiple burn marks, he was visibly shaking from the pain.

"I can help relieve the pain, will you let me?" I asked quietly and looked at the Yamanaka Clan Head for permission. The medic-nin would be here any minute now but all the trails I would be able to gain for the moment would end here if he were to pass out from the pain.

Something was very wrong here, and my instinct was telling me that I needed to grasp the thread before it was pulled away from me.

"What are you going to use, genjutsu?" Inoichi-san glared at me with scepticism.

"Yes, the burns on his skin is overwhelming his nervous system. I can make him … feel less with a weak genjutsu." I explained, but the man still didn't look convinced. "I've been practising it for months now and I won't touch anything else."

"Fine, do it with extreme care, just to keep him from going into shock before the medic-nin is here." As soon as Inoichi-san gave the order, I kneeled down in front of the injured man.

"Takeda-san, this will help with the pain, so please don't fight it." I made sure to wait until he gave a sign that he had heard me before I let the Sharingan bleed into my irides and extended the soft yin chakra. No matter how I put it, genjutsu by essence was a dangerous class of ninjutsu, so things would get ugly very fast if he started to fight me.

"Takeda, is the pain getting better?" When Inoichi-san asked the man, I kept my eyes on him. This genjutsu was delicate, after all, I was not trying to destroy something this time. After a few seconds, Takeda nodded.

"Akina and I … took him into the interrogation room and …" He squeezed his eyes shut as if he were trying to remember the details that led up to this tragedy.

"I was setting up the seals around the room but the captive regained consciousness and bit his tongue ..." The man let out a raspy breath followed by a few coughs. Unfortunately, there was a limit of what I could do without wrecking his senses, so I didn't dare to turn up the genjutsu.

Inoichi-san's eyes were grimmer by the second. He could feel the man's pain, but he didn't stop the inquiry. Deep down, he probably knew that something was strange about the timing and location of the explosion.

"We thought he was trying to commit suicide … but we didn't expect it to activate an explosion. Akina was right next to him and …" At that point, he couldn't continue anymore. I glanced at the woman - Akina - briefly. The front side of her body was badly burned, which was consistent with the other shinobi's statement. She probably absorbed most of the explosion, which was what allowed the other shinobi to at least have a chance of survival.

If the Ame-nin wanted to conceal secrets, he would have done it when they first apprehended him. If he wanted to take down some Konoha shinobi with him, he should have done it when someone of high-rank was near him, or when he was surrounded by more shinobi - which he had plenty chances of before he was put in the interrogation unit. After all, it was just a bite away.

That left the two shinobi who were with him when he died - Takeda and Akina - extremely suspicious.

"We're losing him," Shun warned sharply as Takeda seemed like he was about to pass out over Akina's body. Thankfully, the medic-nins finally arrived with their green, glowing chakra that seemed to provide the only source of warmth in the corridor.

"Takeda-san, did you see him biting his tongue with your own eyes?" I asked after a few minutes when the medic-nin took over the job of minimising his pain and keeping him conscious. Beside me, Inoichi-san sent me a sharp glare, clearly telling me not to push the man too far. Yet, he didn't directly voice his objection.

Takeda took a few moments to think before replying, "Not with my own eyes. I was activating the seals on the wall … Akina noticed it and called out to me but I clearly saw blood filling his mouth and it was dripping down …" He looked like he was hurting just by recalling the memory with the way his scarred hand was shaking.

"That's enough. Yamanaka-san, he can't take any more questions for now." The medic-nin shut us up as she soothed her patient. "I can tell you that he will most likely survive this, so you can get your questioning done after he's out of danger first."

"Yes, of course," Inoichi-san assured as he waved us away.

"Okay, I agree that this event is strange but Maiko, I have no idea why you are here and I sure as hell didn't assign you on this case, so what are you doing?" Inoichi-san directed his gaze at me and when Shun tried to explain, he turned to him and yelled: "You shut up. All you do is try to find excuses for her."

"Inoichi-san, don't you also find the Amegakure shinobi familiar. His accent, the … attitude in his words when he addressed the leader of Amegakure?" I asked tentatively, hoping it could jog up some of his memory.

"What are you talking about? What do you mean 'also'? When did we ever have anything in common?" That last part was uncalled for, really. However, it seemed that he was willing to entertain the idea for at least a moment, so I waited patiently as the man search his memory.

"Hang on, you're talking about that time I probed your memory for the attempted kidnapping." Suddenly, he looked up. "You're right, the accent does seem quite similar, but that's a very hazy and subjective conclusion to make. You know, after that incident, your father and the Hokage turned the village upside down to find spies. In the end, we found two Kumo spies, one Iwa spy and one Suna spy. We didn't think any village other than those could have the resource to breach the Uchiha Compound. Since your father killed the kidnappers, well, as you can see, living, identifiable Amegakure shinobi in captivity is a rare species, and now he's gone as well.

He shook his head at the grisly scene down the hall and a moment later, he spoke up again. "If that old case is what you are hung up about, I can help you sort out the details later after I am done with this. You still haven't answered my question, why are you here?" It seemed that a little jog on the memory lane wasn't enough for him to forget my intruding presence.

"I wanted to look up something in the archive, so I asked for Shun's help. Although I believe I still have access to that storage, so he's not actually breaching any protocol." Technically, unless my Anbu Captain privilege was confiscated by the Hokage, I could access the documents in this particular archive, whose security clearance was way lower than the Anbu Archive. Still, I said it with utmost care so that I wouldn't piss him off anymore.

"That's the theory, yes. But as of now, I'm clearing the premise, so the two of you, get out." Yep, he was reaching the limit of his patience. Without anymore said, we nodded.

As we walked away, the Yamanaka Clan Head let out a tired sigh and turned around to check on his injured subordinate. As soon as I saw his attention directed elsewhere. I tugged Shun's arm and dragged him back into the archive, despite his silent protest.

"I'm not done yet and I'm not leaving until I am." The explosion would seal the Intelligence division for days, and there would a lot of inconveniences if I wanted to come back again. In addition, I had just seen another thread and I wanted to do nothing else but try to catch it.

Shun rolled his eyes but he didn't object. "Wait here, I'll get you the files." Quickly, he disappeared into the jungle of files.

 _What did I do to deserve a friend like that?_

"Okay, on that day, there weren't any unusual reports in the morning. However, after 2100, there was a collection of reports from both the Konoha police and the shinobi dispatched by Hokage-sama because of the incident at the Uchiha Compound." As soon as Shun had dropped the pile onto the ground, I took the thick file on the top.

"They broke into the compound around 2100, depending on the entrance they took. The time from the gates would vary. However, if they were from Amegakure, then the closest gate would be the North gate." I muttered as I ran my finger down the page, landing on the column that indicated the location.

"The incident was reported to Hokage-sama five minutes afterwards, and by 2130, all the known entrances to the village were shut and a carpet search of the village for any remaining perpetrators were conducted," Shun added. I had never known that it was such a big deal back then that all the gates were closed for us.

I continued to run my eyes at the report, and soon, I was flipping onto the third page. However, just as I was about to flip another page, I stopped and returned to one of the previous lines.

"Hang on, if the Hokage started to issue commands at 2108, then why was one of the Anbu teams 'searching for potential suspects' at 2115." Upon hearing my words, Shun immediately turned his attention to the line where my finger was pointed at. The sighting was reported at the Northwestern border by one of the regular patrols that rarely caught anything. It was said that at the time of the sighting, the patrol had no idea what they were talking about since the orders hadn't reached that far yet but they let it go since they were Anbu. Besides, with that incident at the Uchiha Compound, their stories matched perfectly.

"Wait, is that observation being made by the village patrol? Then why am I not seeing that line on this event report?" Shun held up his file for me to check. The format was almost the same and despite some wording differences, all of the time stamps were there but that one line seemed to have been omitted.

"Why are there two reports of the same format?" I asked in confusion. Both of them were event summaries, collected from various sources - village patrol, gate watchers, Uchiha Police patrols - pooled together in chronological order, a standard way of formatting an event record.

However, the one Shun was looking at had a small Konoha insignia labelled in the right corner, but mine had the Uchiha Police emblem instead.

"I remember when this first happened, the Uchiha Clan wanted to investigate on their own, and the village let them but there was no way Anbu stopped their investigation. The Intelligence Division must have requested a detailed event record from the Police Department first out of politeness. But if you look at the date of the photocopy, the police version was submitted much later than the one from Konoha. The intelligence must have gotten tired of waiting and took Konoha's report instead but somehow, the Uchiha Clan managed to dump in the report at the last moment and the one who filed the report didn't bother to do any more checking and just kept both." Shun explained as I rubbed my thumb against the black and white fan insignia.

 _So that's how it was, that explains so much._

"I still don't understand, what is wrong with that one line? The Hokage must have dispatched Anbu after that, so what's wrong?" Upon hearing Shun's inquiry, I closed my eyes for a moment, remembering why replaying that sentence in my head had sent a chill down my spine.

"You don't find it strange because you don't know how Anbu works," I said as the grim realisation finally dawned on me. "We have countless drills each year dealing with each kind of situation that could occur and the response time is calculated carefully."

"In this particular kidnapping, the known perpetrators were eliminated on sight, and that news would have been brought to the Hokage when my father had sent the message. The prime threat was neutralized but there was still the possibility for other accomplices. Therefore, the state of emergency in the village was to search out any possible suspects left in the village. The standard response for Anbu would be to form a blockade around the village and start the carpet search." Against all odds, I managed to find a dusty old map of the village that was hanging on the wall and spread it out in front of us.

"The village patrol deals with the village border but Anbu patrols the more periphery side. So as soon as the order was out - which should have been when the Hokage sent the correct signal flare - those Anbu in the outer area would be tightening into a blockage to prevent anyone from escaping." I drew a large circle on the map, brushing off the thick dust which mapped out the blockade.

"Since Anbu's orders were given explicitly by the Hokage to avoid unauthorised orders, the rest of the Anbu in the village would be gathered at the headquarter, waiting for the Hokage to give his command. For the carpet search, the first area of interest would be the Uchiha Compound and the surrounding areas but the shinobi from the Police department were concentrated in that area, so it would be inefficient for more forces to be sent there. The border and village patrol would seal off the forest that lined the border and prevent any citizens from going there. One of the principles of Anbu is the precaution. In the event that the apparent threat is eliminated, we search the areas that were most vulnerable or devastating for potential follow up attacks. That means the central commanding areas and populated regions," I pointed out the locations on the map and all of them were in the centre of the village, closer to the Eastern side. None of them was anywhere close to the place where the 2115 report was made.

"Anbu would spill out from the headquarter, move into the surrounding areas, cover the centre first, then expand to the border. The same thing, after the blockade was securely formed, we close in and tighten the circle. It's the most effective way to do the carpet search and to make sure all grounds are covered systemically. So unless another sighting was spotted, the border and the area just outside of it would be the last place to be covered by Anbu. Seven minutes were definitely not enough for a team that was conducting a thorough search to reach the Northwestern border." I marked a large X on the spot where the sighting was reported.

The Western tip of the village contained very little population, so it wouldn't be the first place to be protected by Anbu. Instead, it was first sealed off and quarantined, with just enough surveillance to make sure that if any threat were found in that region, a signal flare could be sent out. After all, if the 'sandwich' formation were done right, the hidden intruders would be pushed out into the periphery just outside of the border, where a battle could take place without any villagers being endangered.

Unfortunately, the Uchiha Compound was just in that area, a small and dense compound that stood out against the scarce landscape.

"What about any Anbu teams that were just returning to the village?" Shun asked but I just shook my head.

"The order is clear, if one sees the flare outside of the village, they would go to the border blockade. If they entered the tunnel already, they should not stop until they reach the headquarter. Besides, I don't remember an Anbu exit being placed there. So if these shinobi's response to the patrol's question was 'searching for potential suspects' instead of 'reporting to Hokage-sama', either they were highly undisciplined, or they were not Anbu." We both knew that the former would not happen, which meant the circumstances were pretty much self-explanatory.

The Konoha report was the one that Danzō could tamper with but not the one from the Uchiha Police Department, not when it was still a clan-based organization where blood ran thicker than anything else. But that small difference didn't matter that much because, at that time, the Uchiha had no one in Anbu either.

"They were from Root, and they were near my family's compound. It was him, Danzō got the Ame-nins into the village and helped them into the compound, he must have secret tunnels all over the village barrier for Root use only. I need to go check out that place, there must be an exit close by." I was in a hurry, all high on adrenaline from finally catching onto a possible clue. However, before I could rush out and knock off any more files, Shun pushed me back and held me in place.

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves here. Sure, this is incredibly suspicious but why would Elder Shimura want Amegakure to gouge out your eyes when he has no motives to help that village?" _Well, maybe he is just a jackass bastard who betrayed the village._ But no, the answer was right in front of me and it was even more horrible than if he had just wanted my eyes.

"He wasn't aiming for my eyes; he wanted Sasuke. Whether he planned to ambush them later or if he reached an agreement with them, he never planned to let the Ame-nins keep him. But when Danzō got the message that things didn't go according to his plans, he made his agents retreat. Unfortunately, they exposed themselves due to bad timing but since those Root agents were trained to disguise as Anbu, they fit in seamlessly." Oh, the irony, turned out, he really didn't give up on finding a young Uchiha for his collection. But with how he was recruiting children from the other clans, he couldn't just take him even if he had the chance to do so. Instead, he wanted to use me as a witness so that I could point the crime towards foreign shinobi.

"That bastard! I'm going to kill―" I slammed my fist down on the shelf and shook piles of reports onto the ground. I must have been yelling at the top of my lungs because Shun had temporarily forgotten about the falling reports and covered my mouth in a hurry.

"Shh… nobody's killing anybody right now, and especially not by saying it out loud. The privacy seals in this room have a limit, you know." He hushed me at the exact moment when the door swung open, revealing an extremely irritated Yamanaka Inoichi.

"What the hell was that! Why in the world are you two still here? Did I not make myself clear?" He was ready to drag us out and was probably contemplating the possibility of imposing a lifelong ban. Then, he saw all the fallen reports in the room. The face he was making made me think that the lifelong ban was a very likely outcome for me.

"Whatever … just clean that up and don't remind me that you ever existed in this space." Slowly, he closed the door with a small clink. Well, that certainly smothered my anger quite a bit.

"I'm so sorry, Shun, do you need a pardon from the Hokage?" I thought that was the least I could do if he happened to lose his job after this.

"Not right now. But remember that offer, just in case." He was already bending down to pick up the fallen papers and I joined him a moment later.

"Is this enough for the purpose of your trip?" Shun asked as we sorted out the files.

"Yes, that was plenty." It wasn't just the kidnapping attempt with Sasuke, rather, in light of what had just happened in the interrogation room, I was very inclined to believe that the Ame-nin had come here to find Danzō.

What made it more interesting was the fact that a Root agent - I was about ninety percent sure it was that women named Akina - sacrificed her life to silence him.

Amegakure was a mistake from Danzō's past - A mistake he was trying hard to erase.

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"You want to go to Amegakure - a highly secluded village with a dictatorship - and steal some secret information that dates back close to a decade and may not even exist?" Have you gone mad yet? The Hokage had left the sentence unfinished but the undertone of his sarcasm was already crystal clear.

"If you wish to say it like that, then more than half of the Anbu missions would be considered as suicide missions," I responded. The Hokage scrunched his eyebrows under that enormous hat, allowing me the pleasure of seeing all of his displeasure written brightly on his face.

"You know full well that's not our point." Right now, I could tell that the Jonin Commander came very close to rolling his eyes at me. "Inside the village, we can at least try to keep you safe from Danzō. But outside, he is untamed. If words leaked that you went out, he won't hold back in attacking you."

"Danzō has control over too many functions in this village. The only way for me to gather anything is to find them outside of the village." Or do you still not trust me even after all my attempts to not burn the village into the ground? Yep, I had definitely gotten better at stopping the words at where I wanted them. The Hokage looked down at the report which I just brought to him ten minutes ago from the Archive room. His eyes were glued to the page but I wasn't sure if that's where his mind was at.

Since I refused to sit in front of him like a child waiting to be reprimanded, I decided to pace around the room, much to the other two adults' chagrin. Just as I waited for the Hokage's answer, the window was nudged open by a tiny figure.

With the Hokage's permission, Pakkun hopped down onto the desk. Very briefly, he nodded at me and I returned his acknowledgement.

"The location marked on the report does have an unusual mix of scent trails leading to the fence but the ninkens are still trying to pinpoint the exit. Those scents are of varying degrees of freshness, ranging from a few days to a few years. However, there is just one very recent trail of scent, not any older than ten minutes." As Pakkun reported his findings, I shifted slightly. Danzō had sent someone out, despite his recent strategy of pulling into hiding.

That dead shinobi from Amegakure was a trigger, and it forced him into action despite the tight situation he was in.

"Keep up the good work, Pakkun." Upon hearing the Hokage's acknowledgement, the ninken nodded diligently before he disappeared through the window.

"The Northwestern direction … I can get the Hyūgas in that area to be especially careful of anyone appearing out of nowhere. Perhaps we could apprehend an active agent," Commander Nara suggested and I frowned at his words.

"Hyūgas? I thought they are not getting involved in this any further?"

"They don't want to get involved politically, which means they won't be making accusations at Danzō and directly taking my side to oppose him," the Hokage explained, "but asking them to join the patrol for security reasons is not above their duties."

That made sense, seeing that we had just established that the Hyūga Clan was a much cleaner place than Anbu in terms of infiltrations made by Root. Having them to keep an eye out around the village periphery for anyone strange could prevent large-scale migration of Root out of the village, at least to some extent.

"Why not follow him? Chances are, that agent is going to Amegakure," I proposed instead. Having a live agent in our custody could be useful - they were a rare species after all - but the potential benefits were limited by the cursed seal and a contaminated Anbu agency.

Finding out why Danzō had decided to respond so urgently to the appearance of Ame-nin in the village, on the other hand, was something that could lead to a lot of unexpected possibilities.

"Just so you know, this could very well be a trap. Once you're outside the village, we can't protect you. In fact, we can't even act like you're outside," Commander Nara warned as he shook his head and cast his vote of disapproval.

"Not only that, we have limited information on Amegakure. If they have indeed sent someone to Konoha out of desperation, something must be wrong in that village." I stayed silent after the Hokage had finished speaking.

The risk was out of the world, and the reward was uncertain.

"That Root agent is our information." Still, I had to try. "If this is not a trap and he was willing to send out people at a time like this, then this mission must be important for him and he is confident enough to complete it with just one agent."

One agent was more for a mission like sending a message, intel retrieval, or assassination. Either way, the urgency signified that Danzō probably knew more about Amegakure than we had ever imagined.

The assassination was unlikely since it was the insignia of Hanzō the Salamander that the Ame-nin had borne, it meant that whatever dealing Danzō had with Ame, it was initiated directly with the leader. After all, Ame was pretty much a village with a one-man hierarchy. If he had planned to silence anyone who knew about his involvement by force, then the Salamander would have had to be on his list.

With how that shinobi was silenced, it didn't feel like Danzō was going to help Amegakure, whatever form of help they requested. Therefore, it was more likely that the agent was sent to retrieve something unnoticed.

"Fine, I see your point." I let out a sigh of relief upon hearing the Hokage's words. "But as per our agreement, you are not going alone." Nevermind, you are not getting my point. The whole point of this operation is the covert aspect.

"We are short on staff, like, a lot." I didn't even want to count how many times that phrase had been uttered in the past two days. "None of you can come, Kakashi has other things to do, and I don't particularly trust anyone else from Anbu at the moment."

"Then we get some more reliable staffs." He said it like it was 'just that easy'."I do have someone else that I trust and he should be a great help. So please, be patient and wait here." Before I could get more information, the Hokage had already left the room. So instead, I turned towards the Jōnin Commander. He gave me a look that said 'don't ask me, I don't deal with this crap'.

"By the way, your brother is still at my place, and it's getting harder and harder to placate his inquiries about where you are. What do you want me to do?" The man asked as he looked at me with a blank face. Right, there's still that.

"What do you want me to say, tell him lies, tell him the truth?" I couldn't help but mock. They had made it clear that telling him the truth before this ended was ill-advised and that pretty much truncated half of my available options. "Tell me, how do I tell him that everything he believed in was a lie and that the truth is something that cannot be uttered?"

For once, the wise man seemed to be at a loss for words.

It was unfair of me, perhaps, to push all my anger onto him. After all, he was just here for the crisis management. "Just tell him I'm on a mission, a long mission. I'll talk to him myself after this is all over," I finally said.

What am I doing? The voices screamed in my head. This whole thing started with lies and omissions, so what I am doing? But I truly didn't know what else to do.

The man nodded without a word. Just like that, this room was getting depressing again.

Five minutes later, the door was opened again. Before I could respond, someone held out a stuffed backpack in front of me. I looked up, and the bear mask stared right back at me emotionlessly.

"That's all you need for the trip and he is coming with you. Trust me on this, he knows what's happening." The Hokage couldn't have been more concise on the explanation.

"You told someone else that …" I wasn't even sure what to call everything that's happening right now, not that it made me feel any less of the disbelief that came with it.

"He's your teammate, isn't he? I'm telling you that he won't be a spy for Danzō. It's the only way I'm letting you out of the village, Maiko."

I looked to my right, and Bear was still holding out the backpack, so diligent that he was like a statue. Frankly, he didn't look any less awkward than I did, so all he could do was keep holding onto the backpack.

Eventually, I took the bag and inside it, I found an Anbu mask - it was a cat.

"Take Exit 7, that one hasn't been used for a while. It takes around two days to get there, another two to get back so hopefully, the identification seal will be done by then."

I glanced at Bear one more time. I couldn't disagree with the fact that with him, my chances of survival would increase significantly. There must be something special about Bear if the Hokage was so convinced that he wouldn't stab me in the back on our way to Ame. But that conversation could wait until later. If I wanted to catch up to the Root agent, we should probably get going now.

We nodded at the Hokage's order and exited the room using the ceiling. There used to be a team of Anbu here always but the Hokage had decided to dismiss them recently.

As we moved along the dark passageway in silence, we each covered ourselves with one of those bulk-produced black cloaks. I put on the cat mask and Bear switched his mask to something that looked like a weird lizard.

"We should probably talk about this," I whispered when we were already a few hours out of the village. "This is going to be a really awkward and uncomfortable trip if we don't."

"... Now that you've put it this way, I guess we have to," Bear muttered with a sigh.

I eyed the two black dots far in front of us and said: "There are two of them."

"Yes and I thought we are going to talk—wait, what? Two, are you sure?" Bear was squinting his eyes behind that mask but it probably didn't help that much. I had to use the Sharingan to sight them and when I did, I did a double take to make sure I was seeing it right.

Kakashi's ninken had only caught the scent of one of them but my sight was clearly telling me two. Somehow, I had a feeling that even if Falcon were with me, he would have trouble sensing one of them as well.

That gave me a really bad feeling.

"Yes, there are two of them," I confirmed one more time. Barely five steps out of the village and I had already realised that we would be in a very troubled predicament.

See, we couldn't kill them on the way because that might alert Danzō of our presence if he hadn't already managed to figure it out already. Unfortunately, we also couldn't just wait for them to return and steal the information on the road because it was unclear whether Danzō's order was to retrieve the info or to destroy it.

So either way, we were stuck playing hide and seek with these two highly paranoid Root shinobi, one of which had a negligible presence that was very disconcerting.

"So, you want to tell me why the Hokage decided that you are trustworthy?" It was only after the words had left my mouth that I realised how rude it sounded, so I added immediately, "I don't mean it to be offensive but if you know everything, then I'm sure you know what a messy place Anbu has become."

For a second, he was quiet, very quiet, and I had a feeling that he was going to give me a news flash, which I could probably do without at the moment.

"Senpai said that I probably shouldn't tell you this but I think you deserve to know if you are on a mission with me. Please, don't freak out, I would never mean you any harm." He lifted his mask very briefly, so swift that I only got to catch a glimpse of that mark on his tongue.

Not a second had past and my hand had already reached the hilt of my sword.

I was right, I was definitely not ready for the news flash.

"You … You are … Were one of them." I found myself choking on the words but I managed to get some of the facts straight. One, he was in Root. Two, he was not anymore. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. I kept on repeating the mantra, hoping that the shock wouldn't turn into hyperventilation.

He's too close, one metre away, behind my back, able to kill me just by crushing my neck. But he won't. With that in mind, I pushed the half-drawn sword back into its sheath.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you. I should have given more warnings." Immediately, his politeness turned into regret and panic. He took a step back to give me more room to compose myself for which I was grateful.

Yeah, I don't think any warning can prepare me for that.

"Your cursed seal is showing, yet you're walking and talking … How?" I asked in confusion because that was not how it had worked out for Ryuu.

Bear stayed silent. From his conflicted expression, I realised what was going on.

"Your seal was never activated, was it?" I asked lightly. He couldn't answer my question in any direct way but from his facial expression, I could tell what he wanted to say.

It was a confirmation. Since Bear's seal was visible, Danzō must have added the invisibility seal after he had left.

"I didn't know it was possible for one to leave …" I really wanted to ask how but I doubted that he was in the position to give me an elaboration.

However, it seemed that he understood my desire because he rubbed his neck and said, "Mm, how do I put this. There are many things that couldn't be done with one person but they may be possible with help from others."

Yep, this is going to be a good topic to practice communication strategies on, notably about how to use vague words and read facial cues.

"Kakashi, he helped you get out?" I asked tentatively and his eyes lit up in agreement. I thought so. That explained a lot of things, I supposed, including why the Hokage had decided that he had passed the loyalty test without the need to use that identification seal which was yet to be created.

"How is that boy on your team doing?" Bear voiced his own question as we continued to traverse the forest of Fire Country following the two ghosts. A moment later, he added hastily, "I don't want to be intruding, it's just that we have a lot in common."

How's that not intruding? I guessed that I couldn't really judge since our earlier conversation was nothing but intruding. Besides, how could one be mad at Bear? He didn't get angry, he didn't get sarcastic, and he was good at his job. With all three traits, he was truly a special existence in my social circle.

"Really, did you also try to assassinate Kakashi after spying on him for god knows how long?" I blurted out without much thought.

"Um …." Right, that was also in the realm of things that he couldn't say but his expression was definitely a 'sort of', if not a 'yes and I still feel guilty about it every day'. I should have known that this is a standard procedure in Root.

"You worry about the boy," I said that as a statement and a moment later, Bear nodded.

"I do. Failure is never kind to people like us. I also know that trust is not easy for you either but for that boy, he won't have a place to be, not after this." I listened without making a sound and left the chirping of the birds and the rustling of the leaves to fill the holes instead. Then he said, "At dawn, I brought him to the Hokage's office to get his Anbu tattoo reapplied."

I whipped my head around in surprise. I did not expect him to know that and I definitely did not expect him to bring it up. The Anbu tattoo was more than just an identification. If one looked closely, they could see the thin lines that filled the overall shape of the Konoha Leaf. It was a seal that could allow for very limited communication. When the Hokage summoned us, it would glow bright red; when it was the Anbu Commander, it was a dark shade of magenta; when it was a Captain contacting their own team, it would glow a colour of crimson. Moreover, it was connected to our heartbeat, so if we were to die when we were out on a mission, the Hokage would know. However, these functions only worked within a certain range - a radius that extended about halfway into the other four major countries.

That was the best we could do with a portable seal of that size. Nevertheless, it was a link in more than one way. Reapplying a tattoo would render the old one useless. When Falcon, Zebra, and I broke away from Team Ro, we had ours reapplied and a new design was placed to establish a new link. However, if one were to retire or leave Anbu, a dud was placed on instead. Just like that, the link would be broken.

I imagined that in most cases, the action of reapplying the tattoo was done voluntarily. Most, but not always. In this case, the Hokage had asked me what I wanted to do, so I decided on a course of action for him - for both of us.

"You're judging me," I whispered, and before he could deny it, I continued, "I'm not like him. Kakashi, I mean. I can't tell Ryuu that all is forgiven, not yet. I don't have the power to tell him that he should come to my side if he has nowhere else to go because I can't actually give him a safe place to stay." Those were all excuses, to be honest. Put simply, I just did not have the courage and the heart to try. "I can't do for him what Kakashi had done for you."

"I'm not judging you and I would never compare you to Senpai. I've seen you two make very different decisions with regards to the same situation … Not that one is better than the other, they are all great." He was panicking and I was already regretting starting this whole conversation. After he paused for a moment to compose his language, he said, "I admit that I have a personal agenda. I was hoping that I could convince you to not give up on him, not yet."

"I'm not," I snapped, the irritation unmistakably leaking out of me. Who said I wanted to give up on anyone? I didn't want to be given up on when OLYMPUS abandoned me but I had no control over it, so screw that. But I didn't want to give up on anyone, even if Ryuu had been a pessimistic little prick ever since I had first met him.

"I'm not giving up on him, at least not until this is over. The tattoo, it's—" Before I could finish the explanation, Bear immediately stopped me from going any further into the details.

"No, it's okay, you don't have to tell me anything." He was shaking his head furiously. "Thank you for saying that. That's all he needs." See, how can I ever get mad at this? Damn it, now I feel bad for raising my temper.

"I make no promises. I said I'll try not to leave him to rot and die while this mess is still occurring. As for what comes afterwards … I'll deal with that when it comes." Not giving up on Ryuu during this period was because of my duty, I told myself. I had to prioritise, and dealing with emotional shit like this was not very high on my agenda list.

"Now, this conversation is over, let's move on." At this point, I would do anything to direct this conversation away from me and my inability to make a sound decision.

"How much?" I asked and when Bear gave me a confused look, I clarified. "When the Hokage said that you know what's happening, how much did he mean by that?"

"Everything that has happened in the past two days, the plan of the raid, and what I needed to know to complete the mission. Those were all, I supposed," he answered.

"And the Uchihas?" I prompted again, leaving the words vague so that it wouldn't reveal anything it shouldn't unless he actually knew what I was talking about.

He paused for a moment before finally replying, "You mean the Uchiha Rebellion?" I guessed that answered my question.

"He told you everything about the massacre? When?" I thought this was supposed to be a secret, so dark that it couldn't ever see the world, or did that just apply to me? The Hokage was only gone for five minutes before he dragged Bear into this mission and forcibly made me accept him. I didn't know exactly what he had told Bear but I doubted that five minutes was enough to explain this whole convoluted history.

"We've known the possibility of the rebellion for a while now, but that's all I …" His voiced faded as soon as he had seen the way my expression hardened and the emotions being drained from my eyes.

"Who are 'we'?" I asked, emphasizing each and every word. Bear would never include the Hokage in the use of 'we'; he cared too much about respect and hierarchy for that.

"I thought you knew. I didn't mean to—"

"Who else knew about the rebellion before this?" I cut him off relentlessly and he frowned at the slip-up. He didn't want to say but I could probably guess already.

The Hokage had said that he took teams of Anbu with him when he went to negotiate with the Uchiha Clan before the massacre. That sentence had flown over my head because my attention was caught by things that were far more distressing.

When Bear realised that I wasn't going to let it go without a clear answer, he let out a sigh filled with regret. Eventually, he started explaining.

"The night of the massacre, Hokage-sama was supposed to negotiate with the Uchiha Clan in order to pacify their intent to rebel. At that time, the tension had already risen abnormally high between Konoha and the Uchiha. A number of Anbu teams accompanied Hokage-sama as a safety precaution. The majority of them didn't know that the situation was as serious as a possible rebellion, however, some Anbu agents - mainly the captains and some of the second-in-commands - were informed of the possibility of a coup, therefore, our mission also included intercepting any attempts of violence. We were sworn to secrecy about the information because any leak could cause a catastrophic uproar."

As Bear told the most fascinating story of my life - another iteration from another perspective - I shut my eyes painfully. It made perfect sense, how the Anbu were charged with a potential elimination mission when the premise was supposed to be peace. If there was one word that described Anbu perfectly, it was 'precaution' - the elimination of a threat before the onlookers could even realise that there was one. So, was the Uchiha doomed to fall from the moment they had decided to start a coup?

"You have to realise, all we were aware of was the possibility. Besides, because of Hokage-sama's order, Captain couldn't tell you anything even if he had wanted to." Bear was trying really hard to compensate for accidentally selling out his senpai but he wasn't telling me anything I didn't already know.

No, he couldn't, and he didn't want to either. In some aspects, I supposed one could call Kakashi predictable. He might seem annoying sometimes but he would never willingly cause trouble for those whom he didn't want to.

I could see the logic. Clearly, I wasn't fit to receive that piece of knowledge. No matter how one looked at it, it was going to bring anger, pain, and trouble. I wasn't ready then, probably not any better now.

But for some reason, I couldn't stop myself from thinking back. All those moments when I couldn't figure out what I was doing about the Uchiha Massacre. Those moments where I had to decide whether I was just fooling myself, pretending that I could actually make a difference when the goal wasn't getting any closer. I looked back and his presence was emphasised every time for the past four years. I could see him there vividly - he watched and he helped when he felt like it. What else could I have asked for?

Yet, the what-ifs wouldn't go away. After all, what he knew could have changed how I viewed the world, for better or worse. But he didn't tell me, and the what-ifs became useless.

Unfortunately, as Anbu, we took the what-ifs very seriously. It was part of the job description.

"Bear, use the wood release for a disguise, now." Suddenly, I grabbed him and pulled him along with me as I moved behind a large tree.

The two Root agents we were following had moved on from the strip of dense forest into the more sparsely arranged terrain. It meant that they were out of the central zone of the Fire Country. However, just as they had moved on, one of them released a bird and it was flying straight back towards us.

Bear was only surprised for less than a fraction of a second before the wooden vines sprouted out from the ground and covered us like a blanket. From the outside, the camouflage would fit in with the forest scenery perfectly.

We kept our movements still. I looked up and glanced through the tiny slit in the wooden cover that Bear had left intentionally for the purpose of observation. A few minutes later, the black shadow flew over us before quickly disappearing out of the view.

It wasn't actually a real bird as I realised upon closer examination. It had a very distinct black outline and the white that filled the body didn't have any shades or details a normal bird would have.

The bird continued in the direction of the village without having any second thoughts for the forest below, showing that it was probably used for relaying messages instead of scouting. We waited for a few more minutes before Bear released the disguise.

I turned around immediately and scanned the area, hoping that our targets hadn't slipped away. I had already been keeping them at the edges of my vision earlier to minimise our chances of being discovered. Thankfully, the two figures were still visible in my field of vision but the details I could make out were a lot less than before.

"Come on, we need to catch up. I would prefer to have them at a more comfortable range than this," I commented and started moving through the forest before I had even heard a response.

"Wait, what are you doing ... What are you going to do?" My teammate asked in a hurry as he followed along. I was pretty sure that he wasn't asking about the mission, which meant we were still stuck on the previous topic.

"I am prioritising, which is what you should be doing as well," I answered without much emotion. In terms of processing shocking information, I would like to think that I was getting better at it. The key was to focus on the fact that there were worse things that could kill me any moment from now.

Four days, that was the rudimentary timeline for which I would have to keep myself alive outside of the village. It was a huge gamble - a gamble on time, on possibilities, and on every actor involved.

However, it was a gamble I was willing to take because I was sick and tired of just sitting in the Tower, moping over the fact that Danzō couldn't be touched. Instead, I wanted to take a chance to see if I could attack from a different angle, to hunt for opportunities that I couldn't see before.


	43. Chapter 43 - Deluge

Beta'd by Alice (AirisJ).

* * *

Chapter 43 - Deluge

Amegakure was a peculiar city, let's just leave it at that.

A village surrounded by the rocky and muddy wasteland. Humid, sticky, and heavy, that was what the air around Amegakure felt like, even if the rain that had been pouring down just five minutes ago had ceased to fall at this moment. In the outskirt area, there was more water than soil in the composition of the ground. This field was a perfect battleground for water release users, which meant, it was a terrible place for my fire jutsu.

When we were still some distance from the village border, we lost the Root agents. They took a turn into a field of rocks - not towards the village border but away from it - then they disappeared and never made the approach towards the village again.

So right now, I was staring at the vast landscape of grey and wondering where the hell did those smugglers disappear to.

"There are only two entrances to Amegakure and the whole village was surrounded by the muddy wasteland …" I muttered to myself as I tried to rehash all the details Konoha had managed to get from Amegakure, which wasn't all that much. "They had to find a way to cross the wasteland from there, so why are they running away?"

"After the Second Shinobi War, Hanzō started to rebuild the war-torn village." After a moment of silence, Bear spoke up. At first, I wasn't sure where he was going with this but I knew that there must be a reason he was bringing up the history lesson.

"He built infrastructures inside the village, among which there is a huge water reservoir where the village collects the excess rainwater." Like his personality, his voice was calm, as if he was just reciting a passage from the guidebook. "I think, if my sense of direction is correct, the water reservoir is just on the side of the village where the agents disappeared."

"The rainwater drainage pipe." Finally, I breathed out the answer. For a village like Amegakure that had a large amount of precipitation, the rainwater gathered in a flatland village must be transported outside to prevent damage to the buildings.

Amegakure was not going to dump the water near their village border; that just defeated the purpose of building a drainage pipe. Instead, it would be somewhere with some distance from the village, preferably in the lowland area and near a river if possible.

"So, if we can find a secret entrance set up by … Can you get us through?" I asked my companion as we trotted through the mud.

"It has been ten years since I … Had last seen of Elder Shimura. It is very likely that Elder Shimura has updated his diplomatic system of approach." After the long trip, I'd say we were quite good with euphemism.

The giant circular entrance overshadowed us. It was awfully conspicuous for something Root would use but then again, I couldn't find any Amegakure patrols near this area, as if they had simply forgotten that this pipe led to one of the most important infrastructures in the village.

Most of the time, the drainage pipe was locked and I didn't mean this imposing metal cover in front of me. On the side where the drainage pipe was connected to the water reserve, there would no doubt be an impenetrable barrier preventing the water from leaking.

Of course, the impenetrable barrier would inevitably be opened when the rainwater needed to be let out and that was the most obvious and most dangerous entry to the village. Very few people could stop the incoming flood with that high of a velocity and keep themselves from being knocked unconscious by the force and ended up drowning in the river. Moreover, nothing was more noticeable than a huge reservoir being drained, especially if that reservoir carried such a vital function.

Entry by the drainage pipe was neither discrete nor safe. The Ame-nin didn't need to patrol this area constantly; the water did it for them and all they had to do was to monitor the water level.

It was simply not practical and yet, Bear led me here despite all that impracticality. We all knew how Root liked to turn the impossible into the possible. They were quite admirable in that way, bringing me surprises every day.

The drainage pipe cover was supposed to be locked, even if it was more like a decoration. After examining for any traps latched onto the cover, I reached for the metal lock hesitantly. On the first pull, it snapped off with a crisp click - the sign that the lock was recently opened. Just like that, the metal cover swung open sluggishly.

Needing no more invitation, I slipped past the iron bars welded on the pipe and stepped into the tunnel. I waited for a while as Bear squeezed himself in through the spacing as well and with much caution, we ventured deeper along the cement walls.

The light splashing sound below our feet strung together a disjointed melody as we moved forward in the darkness. The melody echoed in the hollow pipe like an ominous drum beat that seemed to signal the arrival of something.

Just as I had expected, when we arrived at the end of the pipe, we found a large metal wall that sealed any paths forward. I touched the surface lightly and let the icy coldness of the metal run through my fingers. Judging by the temperature, behind this surface was the water reservoir.

This meant Danzō must have another entrance very close by, probably on the tunnel wall somewhere … When I turned around, ready to start the search, I found my partner already on the task with a flashlight in hand.

A minute later, Bear's attention zoomed in on a particular spot on the metal surface. There was a small, square-shaped space that was in a lighter hue than the rest of the wall, barely indistinguishable if one were to just scan the surface at large.

Unconsciously, I felt my muscle tensed up in reaction to something. Only a second later, my brain caught up. It was the smell of blood; a faint but distinct scent that lingered in the air.

"Um, could you look away for a moment? I don't really know the exact limit of the cursed seal but I think the next part is definitely overreaching it." Bear asked as he waved his hand frantically at the spot and with an understanding look, I turned around.

"I hope this is older than ten years." I heard Bear muttered to himself as soon as my back was turned. Then, a surge of metallic stench greeted my olfactory system and I had to resist the temptation to look back and see what the hell was going on.

As time passed by, the scent of blood faded, until it was just a lingering whiff like before. After that, I could hear the rustling sound of his hands and fingers, suggesting that he was probably making a series of hand seals.

"I'm done." Not a moment after the rustling sound had stopped, Bear signalled me and I turned around eagerly.

He wasn't really trying hard to hide his left palm which had a cut across it. In fact, a single red droplet was still trying to leak out at the bottom, making it look like someone had drawn a line there with scarlet red ink.

However, other than that, I still didn't see any sign of blood. Instead, on the previously empty wall, there was a cursed seal, finished with black, bold, and powerful strokes. This time, I could truly see the difference between this cursed seal - the same one on Bear's tongue, I presumed - and the one placed on Ryuu.

After seeing the scene in front of me coupled with all the details I had sensed before, I could put together the vague theory on what had happened. All the blood that Bear had let out didn't simply disappear; the seal drank it all, not wasting a single smudge. What kind of menacing hunger did it have, not being satisfied even after it had devoured every single drop it had been offered?

There was a moment of awkwardness as Bear stared at the seal, clearly expecting something to happen. He had this look on his face that said "I can explain everything weird that I have just done", except that he couldn't, as commanded by the cursed seal on his tongue.

However, something did happen. Like a piece of brick, the metal panel along with the concrete slab behind it seemed to be pushed in by some invisible force, shedding dust and making the stagnant water vibrate. In front of my eyes, a space on the wall opened up and revealed a smaller and less refined tunnel.

"I have to say, I'm impressed," I commented, half in awe, half in disbelief. This was some next-level sealing shit that I could only see in the Hokage Tower. For Danzō and his Root faction to be able to install this, they would have to do it while the drainage system was still under construction and right under the gaze of Amegakure's infamous leader - that deserved some recognition.

"Is that supposed to be a good thing?" Bear asked with just a hint of a joke.

"No, definitely not." Taking in a final scenery of the branched tunnel, we stepped in.

The next time we saw a sliver of daylight, we popped up in an alley of poverty. Grey and black walls were stained with rust; the road was uneven and unkempt. The tall buildings cramped on either side of the alley were casting deep shadows onto the entire road. Above our heads, there were some wet clothes and bedsheets hanging on strings of wire that zig-zagged across the buildings, washed so many times that I couldn't quite tell their original colours.

As Shun used to say, "Whenever you are lost for what to do, go to the Intelligence Division, there is always information for everybody," provided you could get in, that is.

 _This village is suffocating_ , I thought as we hid in the shadows, only an alley away from what I thought was their Intelligence Division. Except here, they called it 'Information Department', as written on a plaque above the front door.

A block behind us, the civilians went on with their daily lives and the shinobi patrolled the village mechanically. Even though the village was still functioning like nothing had happened, the tension was so thick that it seemed to liquify right in front of my eyes. The abundance of anxiety seemed to originate from the main keep - the tallest metal skyscraper that kind of looked like a post-apocalyptic alien grave - if those concentrated patches of chakra said anything.

Without warning, my eyes flashed. The Sharingan disappeared as quickly as it had appeared, just for a split second as I double checked my surroundings.

"What's wrong?" Bear asked about my startled behaviour and I just shook my head.

"Nothing. I thought there was something watching us but I didn't see anything wrong." Maybe it was the tension and paranoia; maybe it wasn't. Either way, that feeling of unease had disappeared without a trace and there was nothing I could do until it showed itself again.

We turned our attention back to the Information Department. As expected, the three guards were surrounded by an unsettling aura, revealing the hidden nervousness and panic under the calm and peaceful appearance.

"Any secret passage that you can maybe vaguely hint at me?" I asked with a hint of hope. Unfortunately for this time, Bear shook his head apologetically.

"No worries, we'll just do it the old-fashioned way," I said with a light tone of voice. The Information Department might seem understaffed given Konoha's standards but that still didn't mean we could just walk in through the front door seeing that it was facing a rather large street with many civilians. Even if we were to put the guards under a genjutsu, the location was still too exposed and any movements or changes to the tableau at the entrance would surely draw attention.

Suddenly, my attention was fixated on a figure that just popped into my vision. The man - a shinobi - had just turned the corner and arrived at the street where the front gate of the Information Department laid. He had a folder in his hand - 'Border Patrol' it wrote, with today's date on it along with a time frame 'morning' - and a moment later, he opened it as he continued to walk. His eyes were glued to the page, brows scrunched in concentration. One of his hands clutched onto the folder, making small folds on the paper. As he flipped the pages, his fingers glossed over the paper and stopped momentarily at the upper right corner of each page - it was the time stamp, an increase of fifteen minutes per page, from 0600 to 1000. When he passed the front gate, he exchanged a silent nod with the guards before flipping to the front of the folder again and repeated his earlier motions.

My observation ended when he continued on his way in the direction of the main tower. When I turned to my teammate, he was looking at me, already knowing what I wanted to do next. Silently, we slipped away from the front gate and headed for the alley where that shinobi had appeared from.

Generally speaking, a building as large as this one would have more than one entrance. Back in Konoha, there was a small entrance tucked away in the forest that Shun often used if he just wanted to get to the Psychotherapy Division without passing through the rest of the building. Of course, the guards only let in the trusted few that had reasons to use the entrance frequently. At this moment I didn't know whether I should feel flattered or offended when the guards let me in to visit Shun _after_ my psychotherapy had long ended.

Now in Amegakure, said 'secret' entrance was right in front of us, guarded by two shinobi, tucked away in the small alley, and shadowed by the jagged metal buildings next door. After the quick assessment of the surroundings, I didn't waste any time before walking straight towards the door. By the time one of the guards looked my way, the Sharingan had already bled through and filled the irides whole. The confidence in my steps didn't waver when faced with this new-found attention and neither did my genjutsu.

"Why are you back, Gensuke?" One of the shinobi called me like an old friend. His eyes flickered to my mid-torso - the position where the folder was when the earlier shinobi was examining the contents - and asked again, "Is there something wrong with the files?"

A genjutsu was about my contribution as much as it was about the target's own memory and imagination. I provided cues - the frantic flipping of pages and nervous rubbing of fingers against the timestamp - and pulled on the memories of my target to help them imagine the rest. Although, the underlying rule went that the situation I wanted to create must fit seamlessly into what they expected to see in reality.

"Yeah, somehow, the last two reports - the 0945 and 1000 ones - are not in the folder. I might have dropped them in the storage, or perhaps they were filed wrong. No matter what happened, I need to get them to Leader-sama soon, without any missing pages," I said to them, remembering the stressed behaviour I saw on the shinobi named Gensuke.

"Yeah, man, of course. It must not be easy, being in such close vicinity with our leader at this time," the other shinobi said in an understanding tone as he opened the door with his chakra. Based on what I had observed with Amegakure shinobi, they all exhibited neurotic behaviour from working under stress. A dictator society always functioned on two things; absolute loyalty and fear. Just because all the Ame-nins were loyal to Hanzō to death didn't actually mean that they weren't afraid. They tread on careful territories and avoid troubles. Where there was fear, there was also sympathy for each other. In this situation, the trust they had built with each other in their own ranks was very easy to exploit.

"Thanks, you saved my life, really." I returned the words through the genjutsu, all the while ushering Bear to get in.

"Don't mention it. None of us wants trouble for anyone." The first shinobi waved at me and he even kindly closed the door behind us. I had the time to cast another cloaking genjutsu on us before the door was shut and therefore severed our access to the daylight.

Bear had no problem letting me lead because he knew that the Sharingan provided a night-vision that his eyes could never adjust to. Most of the time, rather than the connotative word that was often associated with fear and blindness, for me, the darkness seemed like a neutral descriptor - something that I just registered as an environmental factor which I should consider.

The benefit was clear, both physically and mentally. I noticed things faster than my teammates - for example, the silhouette of a human leaning against the wall, by a metal door that blocked further entry down a corridor. I received more details and analysed them with a much clearer head without the feeling of mystery caused by the blindness - say, the fact that his chest was rising and falling, slowly, rhythmically, mechanically.

I stopped in my tracks, causing my teammate to stop behind me as well. Still, I locked my eyes on the human figure, watching the clockwork movement of the chest.

But It wasn't a normal clock, no, it was broken. Because the clockwork seemed to lag, every tick was getting slower, until the clock stopped moving and the figure's chest remained still.

"He died …" I whispered with uncertainty.

"A dead guard?" Bear asked lightly.

"No, he wasn't dead before - I saw chest movement - but his heart stopped beating just now," I explained, still sounding confused. Carefully, I checked the surroundings. There was no one else in the area, just one recently dead person and the two of us.

Lightly, I stepped out of the corner and then ventured towards the dead figure. I placed my fingers on his neck and pressed down. Nothing, there was no pulse. There was no blood or any visible external injury on the front side, so I snaked my hand around his neck to examine the back.

His skin was still warm to the touch, yet, the most unsettling thing was his eyes. It was wide open with fear permeating every inch of his eyes. Instead of shock, there was also a sense of desperation, making my confusion even greater. It wasn't until my finger glossed over something icy at the back of his neck that I managed to recall the recent memory and pieced everything together.

"You're right, he's long dead," I finally concluded.

"But you just said …" Before he could finish his sentence, I pulled out five senbon from the back of his head, effectively stopping him in his tracks.

"Kirigakure's Silent Killing Technique, since it can make a living person appear dead, then there's no reason why it can't make a dying person appear alive, although, not quite literally." I held up the senbon in front of Bear and continued to explain, "These were stuck to particular spots on the back of his neck at the same time. Without medical assistance, just three would be enough to paralyse a person, render him unable to speak, and eventually lead to death." The basic set of three senbon usually caused death within a painfully long wait time of forty-five minutes but adding more would speed up the process. He was still alive but in a place like this, one might as well consider him dead.

He couldn't move, couldn't speak, but he could still think if the desperation and fear in his eyes were any hints. Like a doll, he was placed here as if nothing had happened, as if he was simply taking a nap on the job, yet, no one could ever imagine the hysteria under the skin. Quietly, I reached up and wiped down on his face, sealing the eyelids shut to cover up the unsettling eyes.

"A Silent Killer. That would explain his diminished presence." I agreed with Bear. That man must be trained as a Silent Killer for a long time for him to be so naturally attuned to invisibility. As for how Root managed to set up the teaching curriculum, that was a question for another time.

With a sigh, I returned the senbon to where they were, placing the thin needles back into the exact holes without thinking twice before moving on with examining the body.

"This spot was used to stimulate a tenketsu in order to release chakra. They must have used him to open the doors to the storage rooms." Quickly, I showed Bear the dead guy's arm, allowing him to see the tiny red dot under the sleeve.

Indeed, there was a chakra seal on the metal door beside the dead shinobi. When Bear reached out and opened the door, it fell back without trouble, revealing the rest of the corridor that was filled with rooms on either side of the walls. Some of the rooms had doors that were slightly ajar, leaving a slit between the door and the frame.

More importantly, my breath stopped when I saw the faint glow leaking out of the farthest slit on the left. This was the only corridor they had searched and by the looks of it, they had already gone through the area and were more than likely had already found what they were looking for. If we wanted to make a move, it was now or never. Carefully, I closed the door.

"Okay, we are going to get the info from Root first and send them on their way back to Konoha," I explained to my teammate as we both backed a few metres away from the door and the body. If I were Danzō, I would probably issue my agents the order of retrieval first instead of destruction. I, he, no, we were both paranoid, we wanted to make sure that the right file was brought back and just having the agents check them wouldn't be trustworthy. However, I would also issue the order of destruction as well, if the option of retrieval was denied. Better let it get destroyed than fall into the enemy's hand.

"We are going to make them think that the file and the person who tried to take the file were reduced to ashes, and hopefully, that will keep Danzō's suspicion at bay for a little longer than if we just killed them all here and now." As I explained it, my teammate nodded in understanding. Based on our stalking activity for the past two and a half days, we figure out that they were relaying the message back every few hours and they were using a special jutsu-bird thing that I had no idea what it was made of, let alone replicating it to send false messages.

I signalled the body by the door and said, "He's got a similar build as you, maybe slightly bigger, so he's going to help us." It would be a shame not to utilise the nice resource that Root had left us. No blood, no blunt force trauma, just a few hardly noticeable dots at the back of the neck. A perfect body to pass as the victim of any trauma.

Immediately, Bear started to perform a transformation jutsu. In mere seconds, his clothes looked just like the dead Ame-nin with their navy jacket and grey cargo pants. His face looked very generic, and overall, a very good disguise. After that, he used a wood release to make another human doll that looked just like the dead body, so similar that I had trouble telling them apart at first sight. Carefully, I picked up the dead body and swung it over my shoulder, letting Bear moved the wooden doll to the empty spot.

"I will make up a very good cover story for you when they try to incinerate you. I know it's not in your nature but please try to act like a hot-headed jerk, it might make them want to burn you more." I patted on his back with a smile, and he just looked very unimpressed with my joke.

"Okay, jokes aside, be careful. Do whatever you can to keep their movement in sight. Beware of all of their body parts - not just where they hold the weapon - and beware of yours. They have a thousand ways to get to you, and it only takes one senbon." Bear listened attentively as I whispered the words to him. It wasn't very good advice, seeing that it was easier said than done. Nevertheless, he nodded and marched down the corridor.

The glow in the storage room disappeared as soon as Bear stopped caring about the sound of his footsteps. Still, that didn't stop Bear from kicking open the door with a flashlight in one hand and a kunai in the other, courtesy of our dead shinobi.

"Hey, what the hell are you doing?" _'Hey'? Who says 'Hey' in this situation?_ I thought as I set the body down by the door. While Bear took a few more steps and garnered all the attention, I leaned in for a quick peek. In the corner of my eyes, I saw the two familiar figures coming running out of the shelves - one of them had a scroll clutched in his hand, while his other hand was still resting on the open pack on his waist. For a moment, the room was awfully still, as if no one knew what was happening and they had to process the shock before moving.

"Who are you and what did you steal." Bear's monotonous words broke the tableau. The pair of masked individuals spared one look at one another before they charged in for the attack. Choosing to trust that Bear could last a while, I stepped back and closed my eyes.

The mist leaked out of the room, sending a cool shiver down my skin. Then, the familiar scent of burning flames invaded my senses and quickly, the mist thinned down.

I thought back on the four months I've spent in Kirigakure where every target assignment was understated trouble for a team still trying to adjust to each other. _But we got better at it._ I remembered the same cooling touch of the mist that permeated my body at every moment and surprisingly, I felt calmer - a tranquillity that I didn't even realise I had lost in Konoha. I didn't even fully realise how angry I was. I thought I had gotten hold of it, controlled it so well that it wouldn't affect my ability to make logical decisions. But that anger had replaced every fibre of my body until my actions were filled with traces of it.

How could I match a Silent Killer in the art of stealth if I couldn't even be calm myself? That was the first lesson I learned in Kirigakure. I could hide my chakra, make my movements silent, but it would still leave traces unless my action was colourless and emotionless. My target was never the scroll that was the manifestation of my desire. It was always the two enemies locked in a battle against my teammate, a dime in a dozen that I had encountered many times before.

When I opened my eyes again, the mist was more or less kept at bay by Bear's fire release so that I could still make out the flickering silhouettes that tirelessly battled each other. It wasn't the Silent Killer's fault, really. Even though Bear could only use one rudimentary fire jutsu, the storage rooms seemed to be the only places in Amegakure that were dry and utterly unsuitable for water releases.

One of them appeared behind Bear and swung a precise strike aimed at his neck - the kind that only required one shot to kill, except that it didn't because he was fast enough to dodge it. The Root agent landed on the ground, light as a feather, and he wasted no time in kicking his leg up towards Bear's chest, the tip of the senbon barely sticking out of his shoe. The commotion there invited the attention of the other Root member - someone of a smaller stature with pale skin and thin arms; someone who still looked no older than my brother.

That Root agent quickly spread out the large scroll that was carried by his hip and drew something on it with his free hand, instantly making a shape that I couldn't quite make out under the opaque mist. That moment of suspense only lasted for a moment before a large black and white beast sprung from the paper and came to life, and it was running right for Bear.

The Mist was returning because Bear was too busy keeping himself alive against the Silent Killer to keep up with the fire releases. Yet, I still made no attempt at joining the battle I was watching coldly.

Bear was strong, he would be fine. My teammate's calm and collected demeanour as he blocked the senbon from the first Root member further reassured me to stay put. The ink beast jumped at my teammate and bashed him against the shelf and the Silent Killer disappeared as the mist thickened again.

Without any hesitation, Bear blew out a stream of fire to dispel the beast as well as the nearby mist, sacrificing a large claw mark on his arm in the process. Although, what happened next proved it to be the right decision

The reappearance was swift, silent, and deadly if not for the sudden fire release. The fire created just enough visibility through the mist for Bear to realise the unremarkable senbon aiming for the back of his neck.

I didn't know why I could watch it with such calm eyes when Bear barely escaped death that would have punctured his brainstem if he was even a centimetre late. It was even more frightening when the first thought that popped up in my head was "My teammate was too good at fighting".

He had to be good to survive the attacks from two trained agents who rivalled Anbu. But sooner or later, the Root agents would realise that he was too good for an Amegakure intel patrol. We had to end this quickly. It was time to move.

As the Root agent drew up another two lions, Bear performed the seals for a water release in a blur. Just as the ink creatures cornered him from two sides, dozens of water bullets whizzed through the air at a frightening speed, some of them hit the lions and broke them into droplets of ink and the others hit the shelves. Nevertheless, it efficiently kept the two Root members - including the Silent Killer - away from him as they were forced to dodge the transparent bullets.

The ink user - who also happened to have the stolen scroll - was standing beside the shelf I was hiding behind. All of a sudden, catching the exact moment when one of the water bullets hit the base of the shelve and exploded, I pushed the shelf down towards him, faking the cause to be Bear's jutsu. As I blurred away to hide behind another shelf, the iron racks fell onto the young agent, hitting him in the back.

It was a bold move, making such a commotion. But that didn't matter anymore, because the boy's waist pack opened as he crashed onto the ground. For a few seconds, no one breathed as we all watched the simple scroll rolling on the floor for what seemed like an eternity before it finally stopped at a spot between all three of them.

Bear and the older Root agent stared at each other for a fraction of a second, before both of them flickered. The Root agent to the scroll, and Bear to the Root agent. In the end, they met a few metres away from the motionless scroll. They tried to hit each other, block each other and stab each other. Metal clashed against metal, making muffled clanking sounds accompanied by occasional grunts from the loser. This time, Bear seemed determined to keep the Silent Killer near him and it was terrifying, watching him narrowly dance around every deadly strike that seemed to come out of nowhere.

As the two men fought in the middle, the younger boy pulled himself from under the shelf and started to make his way towards the scroll. Bear's eyes momentarily flickered to the boy and he was going to curse himself later because the Silent Killer caught the opening and jabbed the senbon forward. Hastily, Bear moved his arms to guard his chest and neck but the needle wasn't aimed for such predictable spots.

The silvery senbon sailed under his arm and punctured the side of his torso. The internal waves of emotions were sealed before it could surface as I watched the senbon dig into his body, through the ribs, and towards the heart.

However, to my surprise - probably the Root agent's surprise as well - Bear managed to grab the Root agent, despite suddenly having a look of absolute pain on his face. As if it were the last burst of power before death, I saw him aiming a powerful kick to the agent while sucking a painful breath in, sending the man flying backwards, right in my direction. Then, with a hand still clutching on to his injury, he threw a handful of kunai out in various directions, temporarily stopping the boy's attempt to reach for the scroll and forced him to block the attacks.

The moment I saw the Silent Killer crash against the shelf in front of me, I knew: we needed a desperate situation to end the battle and this was it.

As the older Root agent quickly regained his balance and was ready to rush in the battle again, I reached across the shelf, softly, quietly. There was none of that 'humming' feeling people make when the chakra was utilised for a jutsu. Not even the Sharingan was activated, I didn't want to risk anything to break the absolute silence. Still, I knew exactly where to aim.

Just as my finger was about to touch his skin, he jolted in realisation. But it didn't matter anymore as a senbon of lightning burst out from my finger, drilling into the flesh. When my finger left the skin, my chakra was silent again.

His head banged against the shelf as he fell backwards onto the shelf. Before he was fully dead, it was just his luck that a kunai crashed right through his neck, burying that little dot of burned skin in blood.

He hit his head on the shelf, he lost his balance, and then the kunai hit him in the neck. That was all there was to his story.

Dissolving my thoughts of the Silent Killer, I moved to another shelf and looked up at the lightbulb that Bear had turned on when he had entered, Sharingan fully activated, glowing redder every second.

In the end, it was my teammate who grabbed the scroll from the ground, gasping breathlessly as if every moment was full of pain. He glanced at the boy and quickly disregarded him before casually tucking the scroll into his jacket and walking towards the emergency alarm button located on the inner wall.

I could tell that the boy wasn't as experienced as the other dead Root agent because he looked over to his teammate's direction, perhaps, asking for an order. Unfortunately, he only found a bloody body. Before his eyes would even widen in surprise, the dim light flickered, making the room seemed all the more delirious. Somewhere behind the shelf, the set of tomoe in my eyes continued to spin. Swiftly, my genjutsu reached out, painting a story that would explain the death of an Amegakure shinobi and the destruction of the scroll.

 _The boy urgently returned his gaze towards the injured Ame-nin who was walking towards the alarm. He didn't have the time to mourn for his teammate because he had a mission to finish. Immediately, he lashed out a shuriken tied with ninja wire and threw it low above the ground. The shuriken made a circle around the arrogant and careless shinobi and latched onto his feet, making him fall down on his face as he gasped in surprise._

Still keeping my eyes on the boy, I grabbed a scroll from a nearby shelf that looked about the same from the target and threw it to my own teammate who had suddenly stopped gasping like a dying person.

Bear caught the replacement scroll in one hand as his other arm turned into a wood release and retrieved the body I hid behind the door. He placed the scroll in the dead Ame-nin's jacket and held him up until the wire wrapped around the corpse's leg, then he dropped the body onto the ground and retreated to my hiding place.

 _The young Root agent quickly spread out his canvas and drew a dozen snakes and let the ink creatures crawl out like a waterfall. The snakes covered the Ame-nin in no time and restrained him as he kicked and attempted to stop the suffocation. As a last attempt, the shinobi managed to force his fingers into hand seals. It was going to be a fire jutsu, the boy recognised. His ink didn't like fire, so he controlled the snakes to stop the man from completing the seals. Too late, or maybe not. When the snake managed to restrain his fingers, the jutsu was already activated, perhaps just not how the shinobi had hoped. The fire exploded in his own face, so forceful that the boy didn't even get to hear the man's dying scream before fire engulfed his upper body._

I flicked a fireball onto the motionless body wrapped in black snakes, before wiping away the sweat dripping down my face. It had been a while since I had to work this hard on a genjutsu but I needed this one to be a perfection.

 _Ah, that should be fine as well. If we couldn't retrieve it, we should make sure it was destroyed, the boy thought back to his orders as he watched the fire writhed around his body, licking his flesh. He could smell it, the smell of flesh burning as everything was reduced to ashes. When the fire was quenched and his own ink creature was dried up, the Ame-nin was no more than a blackened corpse and all his belongings, including the scroll, was gone in a pile of ashes, He had done it. His mission, he had completed it. Even though there were casualties, all he needed to do was to report to his superior. That was all he needed to do._

The genjutsu ended as the boy sealed up his teammate's corpse and left the room. After a moment of silence, I closed my eyes and scrunched up my nose in an attempt to block out the smell of murder. At least I had something to concentrate on before with the genjutsu, but now, all the sensory signals I had missed just came crashing into my brain in one blow.

"Let me see your wound." Even though it was a request, my hands moved to examine the senbon mark before Bear could give me an answer. Perhaps the reason why he was still standing was that it didn't go in far enough to hit the heart. Still, a punctured lung was no laughing matter.

"Can you feel how far it went in? Shortness of breath, dizziness … wait, it hit the rib?" When I pressed down on the area around the wound, I realised that based on the trajectory I saw, the senbon would have hit the ribcage. Would the Root agent really make such a rookie mistake? I looked up to my teammate in confusion.

"My transformation jutsu is wood-natured. It made me bigger to match the dead body and my disguise is harder to recognise in physical combat than a normal jutsu. Yes, it would have gone straight for the heart if I actually had the physique of our demised shinobi, but I got lucky, I suppose," he explained with a weak smile. "Besides, the layer of wood helped weaken some of the senbon's force, so it didn't drill through the ribcage."

 _Ah, thank god._ I let out a breath of relief and asked, "Were you just acting earlier to sound like a person with the lung bashed in?" He nodded, looking kind of embarrassed.

"Damn, that was good, I almost bought it if you didn't just kick him away like a rubber ball." That wasn't completely true. My heart never really relaxed until I had examined the senbon mark myself. He probably knew it as well, seeing my earlier reaction. But I was glad he didn't point it out unlike some of my other teammates.

"Oh, here's what we came for." He threw me the scroll we recovered from the Root agents earlier and I latched onto it immediately. The scratchy fabric pricked my skin but it just made me clutch onto it tighter. _The manifestation of my desire._ I could feel my own heart beating faster at the prospect of a chance. Not a guarantee, just a chance.

Against my drumming heartbeat, I opened the scroll, careful not to get any blood on it.

"Now I know why he wants it back at all cost," I whispered with a small grin as I showed Bear the scroll. It was a contract made between two parties - Hanzō of Amegakure and Danzō of Konoha. It stated that Danzō would provide military aid to Hanzō to calm the Akatsuki rebellion in exchange for Hanzō's help in claiming the Hokage title.

Most importantly, the contract was signed by both parties' thumbprint - the kind with the chakra infused in the bloody print. Hanzō must have been really sceptical about Danzō's motive and ability to deliver to force him to sign this. After all, the chakra-related contracts in this world had consequences if one party failed to uphold the agreement; it was like a cursed seal on one's chakra.

'Help in claiming the Hokage title' sounded awfully vague. Sure, the Akatsuki rebellion was squashed but Danzō still wasn't the Hokage yet. I assumed that Hanzō only had to do a few things Danzō had specified rather than actually handing him the Hokage title. After all, Hanzō didn't get to decide who became the Hokage, nor would he be dumb enough to make an oath on something he couldn't control.

Made me wonder what made Hanzō reach out to Danzō all of a sudden. Unfortunately, it seemed like Danzō didn't consider them best pals anymore. The sad truth of a friendship that rested on an expired blood contract.

However, before I could look further for the finer prints, Bear reminded me, "We should probably leave now. We are staying awfully long to search for two missing reports." Seeing his reasoning, I nodded and packed the scroll inside my inner jacket, so careful as if I were hiding away my own beating heart.

Not even a minute out of Amegakure's Info Department, a shrieking alarm sounded in the distance.

"I should have guessed that Danzō would destroy all of Root's traces in this village." I cursed in frustration when I realised that the alarm was because of a muffled explosion inside the village grounds. It seemed like the remaining Root agent buried the tunnel using explosives when he left the village, triggering the alarm in the process, causing Amegakure to be in lockdown with a whole lot of shinobi crowded around the tunnel entrance.

Yes, I knew it was the logical thing to do. Explosives were the most efficient way to collapse a tunnel. It was easily detonated and the user didn't even have to be in the close vicinity like they would for an earth release. Maybe it would leave some noise but who cared? Nothing tied the infiltration to Root. When Danzō decided to cut all ties with Amegakure, he really meant it. Yet, I couldn't shake the paranoia that perhaps Bear and I had been found out and this was the boy's parting gift for us.

"Should have killed him when I had the chance." I pushed the words out with a bitter tone.

"You made the right decision." Bear shook his head, clearly disagreeing with my sentiment. "Collapsing the tunnel is just standard protocol. There may be a fifty percent chance that Elder Shimura would see through the plot even with the genjutsu. But if we killed all of them, it's a hundred percent."

Still, we needed another way out of the village. The annoyance died down quickly as I remembered that the Root tunnel was just a bonus and our original entry/exit plan had used the traditional infiltration methods. With that in mind, I opened my Sharingan wide and scanned the village one last time, committing all the details, all the chakra layouts to memory.

We ended up in the junkyard. I figured it fit in quite nicely with the post-apocalypse theme the city planner was going for.

Demolished materials and construction plates filled the area. Where there were fallen piles of metal scraps, metal outcrops protruded in muddy, unkempt fields. My breaths were shallow as I hid behind a construction beam, body flattened against the ground as mud soaked through my clothes, dying it an ugly grey-ish brown that fit the Amegakure wasteland quite nicely.

It started raining at some point and the chill of the droplets seeped into my blood and bones. Nevertheless, the noise of the raindrops was much appreciated.

Carefully, I slithered to the right until there was a stack of metallic plates in front of me. Light as a feather, I pulled myself up against the cover and peeked past the sliver of space between the plates.

 _Nearsightedness sucks_ , I thought as I squinted my eyes to catch the team of two guarding this area of the wall. No more Sharingan for this part, seeing that we couldn't afford to be on any sensor's radar at this critical point. With their grid-like sentry arrangement, our existence would have stuck out like a flag.

The distance between each team of guards was approximately thirty metres – too close to sneak in between but the tight blockade formation meant that they were not moving excessively but sticking to their own areas instead.

On my left, my partner hid in the shadow formed by two stacks of rusted metal. His figure stayed still against the surface as if he were about to melt into it the next second. In a moment, a silent glance was exchanged between the two of us.

Withdrawing my attention, I shifted my fingers lightly to make sure that the senbon were comfortably gripped in my hand. Patience, it was not the time yet. Amegakure had been in a lockdown for twenty minutes and we had been sneaking around for twenty minutes. A few more minutes wouldn't kill me.

The concept of time seemed lost to me as I eased my way closer to the two guards, little by little, inch by inch, sliding my way around the jagged landscape.

The two guards retreated back under the cover of the wall. _I feel you, the rain is hideous._ It was the moment I was waiting for because for this particular team, catching that bit of shade meant being hidden from the view of the other teams, courtesy of the coincidentally placed demolished scraps. Maybe the material dumpers were going for an avant-garde look, maybe they were just lazy, I wouldn't know, but bless them.

The female guard fumbled in her pocket and pulled out a cigarette of all things. She was careful, though, keeping her right hand on her katana always. When the kunoichi breathed out a puff of smoke, the shinobi next to her shook his head and didn't object. However, when the smoke reached the male guard, he scrunched his face and turned away.

Uncaringly, the kunoichi laughed, letting out another breath of smoke. When the smoke faded, I was already behind her. Same thing, no chakra, no noise. Just silence.

I reached out my hands as if drawing the oblivious woman into an embrace from behind. One of my hands cupped her neck, pressing tight to keep her head immobile. But even before that, I pierced the two senbon between my fingers forward with a deadly speed.

Lightly, I wiped her eyes closed and gave the slumping body a push, knowing that Bear was already in position before moving on to her partner.

There was a moment of stillness as I grabbed onto the shinobi's waist to keep his body frozen. Behind me, Bear had already positioned the kunoichi's body by a stack of construction material and curled her hand onto the katana hilt. As a last touch, he placed the piece of cigarette he had caught back in her mouth. A stream of smoke puffed out weakly - couldn't help it, she was still breathing and emitting a chakra signature.

Following Bear's example, I pushed the shinobi's hand - half clutching onto the signal flare - back into his pocket, so softly as if I were merely placating his discomfort. Bear rested his ear against the metal-coated wall and I took a peek at the nearby teams to make sure they were not looking at this section of the wall.

When I turned around, Bear gave me the 'go' signal and handed me a roll of wire. With a slight nod, I stepped onto his cupped hands and flipped myself onto the wall.

This part had to be fast, I reminded myself as I grabbed the rim of the wall, lightly, but with a steady grip. In one swift motion, I lowered myself from the wall, dropped down onto the ground like a lithe cat, stepped firmly onto the wire and pulled it taut.

There was a hard pull from the other side before Bear flipped through as well. We had to go through another layer of sentry outside of the wall. Still teams of two, but they were far more widespread because there was very little cover on the wasteland. We had to bury ourselves beneath the muddy water while waiting for a chance to ambush. Not the best experience but considering where we were trained … Fire Country forest had bugs - lots and lots of bugs.

Bear tightened his hand around the shinobi's mouth and whacked his neck with a force that made me grimace. I felt the unnerving pulse as a nearby sensor extended his search but, in the end, he could only count two familiar signals while his sense retreated. One by my feet, and one in Bear's hand. Without a word, my partner handed the guy to me and I push the senbon in. Control was good, we wanted him to sleep by the wall for as long as possible until the last inevitable moment.

With mud caked on my mask, the humidity was making it hard to breathe, and my knees were soaked in chilling water, yet, I couldn't care less. There was a sense of calming familiarity with the whole 'run, hide, crawl' routine. Back in Konoha, we embraced the dirt and crawled like an earthworm; here, we waded through the mud and the water steadily and patiently. Dignity had nothing on us.

I couldn't remember how much time had passed - long enough for the rain to stop - when we moved past quite a few patches of rock outcrops and moved on to the area near the river.

"You said that technique needed three senbon but you only used two," Bear inquired with a hint of confusion as he spared a glance at Amegakure that grew farther and farther behind our backs.

"It'll make them last longer if I don't push in the last piece. I wasn't sure we could get out of the vicinity within forty-five minutes." I answered without looking back. The lesson was from a personally observed experience. More than one hour had already passed, Amegakure had likely realised the abnormality. But even now, these four Ame-nin could still survive, if they had a medic-nin who was careful with their hands.

"So, the Silent Killing Techniques. I didn't even realise you were inside the room until that Root agent had miraculously died. It seemed like those missions you took in Kirigakure weren't all that horrible." Suddenly, Bear spoke up, prompting me to turn and face him. He looked ridiculous, I looked ridiculous as well. However, none of us bothered to clean ourselves in the river seeing that it would still come in handy in the marshland ahead.

"How did you learn about my supposedly secret Anbu missions?" I asked but before he could answer, I remembered with a sigh. "Let me guess, it was Falcon, wasn't it?"

"... Let's just say that we still talk, sometimes." _That's a yes, I take it._

"Seriously, he will complain to anything that has an ear," I said while shaking my head. "But yeah, when you're in an area where eight out of ten people know silent killing to some degree, you're bound to pick up something."

After Terumī Mei made her intent of reformation clear, more and more radical Kiri-nin turned to missing-nin every day. Konoha, as always, was very concerned with their whereabouts seeing that we were the island's most immediate landmass. Therefore, although nobody had said it explicitly, the 'Konoha - Kiri Friendship Program' continued. Mei didn't have a problem turning a blind eye on us while playing the sympathising leader who advocated unity as a means of protection as long as we kept to the outskirts and left the bodies behind.

"You make it sound as if anyone can," Bear remarked as we ran. Upon hearing that, I just shook my head again.

"These Silent Killers from Kiri, they are truly extraordinary people. I might be a fast learner because of a certain advantage but for me, the Silent Killing techniques are means to an end. I wanted to learn them because they work wonders when you're trying to infiltrate a camp and assassinate a big target quietly," I explained, remembering the horror, or later on, a morbid sense of wonder when we followed the path of a newly declared missing-nin through a villa, where fifteen percent of the guards - sensors and normal shinobi alike - were paralysed and close to dying and the rest had found nothing wrong until the Water Country Official they had been ordered to protect had died in a much faster way. Those guards had died anyway, being discovered too late without adequate healing.

"It takes a certain mindset, I supposed. For a Silent Killer, their techniques are their life, embedded into every aspect until they reached the state of being able to do it without even consciously trying. I might have copied the surface - and only a small portion of it - but the complete package could never be copied without years of immersing oneself in that kind of environment." There was something special about the land of Kirigakure to be able to raise these extraordinary people who aimed to reach the pinnacle of stealth taijutsu. I didn't know how Danzō had trained his own brand of Silent Killers but it was clear that the mindset didn't completely transfer, no matter how technically perfect they had become.

For one, he had lost an ounce of patience when the scroll had been knocked onto the ground and that was the difference between a Silent Killer from Kirigakure and the ones trained by Root.

"I'm surprised she hasn't tried to kill you yet," Bear exclaimed, half joking, half serious.

"Yeah, she probably would if she had known about it, no matter how much she likes having me around." I was pretty sure Terumī Mei didn't _like_ having me around but she seemed … Curious during the few times I had to meet her on the Hokage's behalf. "I'm not stupid enough to use my imperfect techniques in front of her, or in the whole Water Country, for that matter."

Oops, we might have just blamed this infiltration on Kiri missing-nin. But hey, Mei had a lot on her hands and even she couldn't keep track of all those who had defected.

The working relationship between Kiri and Konoha had finally resembled something stable with a healthy mix of benefits and threats. I'd really hate to be the reason why this beautiful relationship bit the dust.

"It seems like you're doing well, after leading a team yourself." I smiled at Bear's kind words, yet there was a pang of guilt rising in my chest. After I had left Kakashi's team, I never really had much chance to spend time with my former teammates who had helped me so much during my darkest times. There always seemed to be a million things on my plate. It was surprising that I would get the chance to do so here, in the unfamiliar land of Amegakure.

"I'm glad to hear that. _We_ are all very glad to know that." Bear's emphasis on 'we' really wasn't that subtle, seeing that he had followed up with a jittery glance and it squashed my newfound guilt immediately.

"It's been two days, why are you still hung up on the slip-up?" _And we had such a good ambience going on here, why, Bear, just why?_

"I'm sorry, but I shouldn't have told you that一" I gave him a glare and he instantly changed the sentence midway, "一What I meant to say was, it wasn't my secret to tell."

I supposed that I couldn't blame him for bringing it up. After all, I had shut down the topic last time with a less than amicable tone. However, the journey to Amegakure provided plenty of time for me to think about quite of bit of things, including this one.

"I'm not blaming you, or Kakashi. None of you did anything wrong and I don't need you to tell me that he has my best interests in mind. But you can't stop me from feeling angry and betrayed for that instant." I finally replied, this time, in a softer tone than before. I paused for a moment, before continuing to finish my sentences."

"I think, I really needed a trip away from the village. I was so focused on moving forward and achieving something that I haven't taken a step back and looked at what I have done so far." 'Prioritising', as I had stupidly called it. What was I prioritising? And were those really the only priorities while all those other things I had to push down were not?

I pressed my lips together for a second, mentally giving myself that one last push I needed to confirm a decision that I had been wavering over for too long. "I'm going to tell my brother the truth, preferably sooner rather than later. Everything that I've learned, I'm going to tell him without leaving out anything."

If finding out that Kakashi had kept the speculation of the Uchiha Rebellion from me had already left me that dejected, I couldn't imagine how much damage it would do to Sasuke if I had kept the truth of the Uchiha Massacre from him.

Correction - I could imagine. I had the same experience merely days ago. Yet, I decided not to think about or even revisit that feeling because it _hurt_. Instead, I tried to find a fix because I had this illusion that this could make the hurt go away and no one - not Sasuke, and especially not me - would ever need to feel it again.

"I don't have a perfect solution and I never will, because this whole thing is as ugly and traumatising as it gets. Whatever reactions he will have, whatever feelings he will feel, we will just have to deal with it together." Perhaps having two minds to share the burden would help us think twice before making horrible decisions, who knows. Now that I had said it, I felt like my mind was in an equilibrium between a newfound relief and an anxiety that burned even brighter than before.

Giving Amegakure one last round of checking, I flashed the Sharingan with the bare minimum of chakra and looked back. So far, no search parties in our direction yet.

"Enough about my problems," I said as I blinked the redness away.

"Why don't you tell me about how you guys are doing while we are travelling back? It might be the last chance to catch up before Danzō sends out a horde to crash the party." I genuinely wanted to know how they were doing. The periodic greetings in the Anbu Headquarter and occasional updates from Kakashi rarely contained anything.

Bear nodded with a smile, but he never really got the chance to start on that topic.

We spun around with our weapons in hand but the man by the river bank just smiled.

"Where are you going? The fun has just begun and you are leaving?" The lazy voice that rang in the air made my blood run colder than the ice. Anyone who tried to greet people with such psychotic choice of words couldn't be good news.

With that unnatural pale blue skin and the slash across his Kirigakure hitai-ate, it was like witnessing a book page come to life.

Hoshigaki Kisame, S-rank missing-nin from Kirigakure no Sato, the Monster of the Hidden Mist.

 _Ah, damn it. We were so close to getting out of the flooded wasteland as well._

"I wasn't aware that you were working for Amegakure, so are you?" I managed to stay calm and return his 'greeting'. _Where did he ... The river. He was hiding in the river,_ I realised when I saw the water dripping down his sleeves.

"Oh, no, who the hell works for these minor villages, unless they are paying big prices, which isn't the case with Amegakure. I'm just a passerby looking for some fun and people to kill." _Definitely psychotic._ I thought to myself as the shark-like man took another step closer, sending all of my muscles and nerves into a hyper-alert state.

"Why don't you just ignore us? We have no quarrel with you at the moment, and you don't want to get caught up with us either." As much as I would love to say that hunting down missing-nin was my duty or something, it really wasn't the premise of this mission.

Compared to everything that had happened on our mission in Amegakure, he was the real unpredictable factor that could destroy everything.

Even if we could win the battle, it would definitely take time and make a flashy scene. And in ten minutes, we would probably be surrounded by half a village of Amegakure shinobi. Better yet, if Bear and I had to use any of our identifiable jutsu which would certainly be the case if we wanted to survive against _him_ , we might as well just give away our position to the runaway Root. That would just defeat all purpose of my genjutsu and extinguish any chance of fooling Danzō about our actions.

"That's unfortunate because you have something I want to see." He was definitely the 'fight first, talk later' kind of missing-nin because before he even finished his sentence, he had already started to make hand seals for Water Release: Exploding Water Shock Waves and he had a river behind him.

Immediately, we spun into motion, running through our own sets of hand seals. Within a moment's notice, the missing-nin's wave rose from the river and crashed down like a mini tsunami. Mine arrived a moment later with water pulled from the muddy field.

Two sets of waves, one slightly smaller than the other, slammed against each other. The smaller wave lost after a struggle but it still negated the bigger wave's hunger enough for the spherical wooden wall in front of us to absorb the impact. Sadly, the battlefield was flooded with more water than before.

When the wave descended because of the loss of energy, I only got a moment of peace before a figure emerged from the waterfall. I bent back at the last moment to avoid a punch to my face but the giant sleeve still slid right over me and knocked my mask off. Quickly, I regained my balance and did a spinning kick, pushing him away from me just for a second so that I could flicker away.

The moment that I landed a few metres away, he had already caught up to me. The missing-nin dipped his hand in the water and summoned up a water prison easily. I had just enough time to flicker away once more before the chakra-draining prism could trap me, never planning to rest my steps for even a moment,

The next minute was filled with tag. Every time I flickered away, he would always catch up and make a water prison like some hunter obsessed with trapping his prey. _I know it was kind of my job to piss off criminals but what did I ever do to you?_

It was very clear from the beginning that he was faster than me in the water. The water was aiding his speed, while I had to constantly spend a lot of chakra just to keep afloat. Thankfully, after the first 'catch me if you can', Bear reacted quickly and started to make wooden columns to block Hoshigaki and that helped to relieve my pressure immensely.

After a body flicker, I landed on one of the wooden columns that stretched horizontally above the ocean. A torrent of marble-like water bullets followed me quickly. Before they could hit me, I hooked the wooden column and jumped down as the bullets whooshed past me. As I dangled on the wooden bridge, I blew out a few successive Great Fireballs before swinging myself back onto the wooden platform again.

As the fireballs crashed towards Hoshigaki, waves of water rose up from his feet and doused the flames. While the water sizzled, Bear caught this rare moment of stillness and raised up a wooden dome that quickly engulfed the missing-nin.

The moment of tranquillity fleeted faster than a shooting star. I didn't even finish inhaling a breath before the man broke out the wooden prison and reduced the columns into splinters with just one wide swing of his sword.

"So it _is_ the Uchiha's Sharingan. Damn, I thought they don't make them anymore." He exclaimed as he rested the giant sword over his shoulder. "This should be really fun, now I really need to keep you here before all the parties can arrive."

If that didn't tell me about leaving as quickly as possible, I didn't know what did. That meant, no more running from confrontations.

However, before I could actually initiate any attack, he disappeared into the mini ocean and popped out in front of me with his huge bandaged sword swinging right at my neck. The clash left my swords vibrating as I struggled to hold on to the hilts despite the shock. When the second strike came, I blocked with my ninjatō again, only to change the trajectory at the last moment and let his giant sword slip past my body. I pressed down on my right foot firmly and pivoted, slashing the tantō at his sword-holding wrist. The tip of the blade scraped past his skin, cutting the sleeve open. Fluidly, my ninjatō arrived at his abdomen, threatening to pierce his kidney. _Clank!_ The giant sword was suddenly switched to his left hand as he took a step back, just in time for him to slam the sword in front of his body and block my attack.

Immediately, he flicked his sword up, the end of the blade splashing out a wave of water that obscured my vision. I flickered backwards and his blade followed in an attempt to slap me aside. With a side flip, I jumped up in the air just as the sword sailed under me. I landed on the tip of his thick blade, already in motion for the next move as soon as my toes found the slightest force to act on. The yin-chakra enhancement on my tantō was activated without a question. Using his giant sword as a temporary platform, I leapt towards him and slashed at his neck.

I was so close to taking his neck off, yet he dodged at the last moment. The coat of yin-chakra only managed to nick his skin, drawing a thin red line against the greyish-blue skin.

At once, I rearranged my position in the air and landed behind him. However, as soon as my feet touched the water, the liquid seemed to have a mind of its own as it tried to claw onto my feet and drag them down. In that split second, he turned around and brought his sword down on me. Without any hesitation, I form the hand seals and activated a wind release with the tasselled strap of the tantō hooked around my finger. The gust of wind slammed into the water, breaking the swirling restraints. The stream of air had just enough force to propel me backwards and help me escape the worst of the blunt attack.

Still, his giant sword of death made contact when I was almost out of range. I had enough time to properly raise my swords and blocked the attack mid-air to the best of my effort. Yet, the power imbued behind that swing was enough to smack my swords back into my own body. The metal made an ugly sound to protest the blunt power it was forced to endure and my ribs made an unhealthy sound just a moment later.

"You have an abundance of yin-chakra, yet you chose to use it for physical combat instead of genjutsu, what a weird kid." I heard him muttering something as he wiped the thin mark on his neck without a shred of concern. _Did he just call me weird? From a guy with grey skin?_

To be honest, I was kind of expecting his blood to be blue.

He was ready to charge again, eyes locked on me without any intention to hide the bloodlust. However, before he could make a move, Bear appeared behind him and aimed a strike right towards his back. Without a doubt, Hoshigaki reacted quickly and blocked the attack with his arm before swinging his sword in one fluid motion to counter it.

While Bear locked himself in a battle against the missing-nin, I didn't join in immediately. Instead, I sucked in a cold breath, against the stinging pain on my chest. His appearance came as such a shock and I needed to re-evaluate my options.

Seeing the defence he got, I needed something that could pierce through a thick wall. Being a former swordsman of Kirigakure, engaging in a kenjutsu battle with him would definitely be time-consuming and my chances would be average at best, even with Bear at my side.

On the other hand, this nightmarish battlefield was the bane of my ninjutsu. Water, earth and wind releases weren't my strong suit in terms of attacking power and asking me to attack him with fire releases were like asking me to blow a fireball in the middle of an ocean - it was called fighting against the force of nature. Lightning releases seemed to be my best bet to deal high damage, or they could potentially electrocute all of us if not used properly, especially with how skilled our enemy was with manipulating the water.

In front of me, the Kiri missing-nin crashed a giant column of water into my teammate. The impact pushed him backwards, only for him to crack into wooden pieces - a wooden clone. Hoshigaki's eyes widened with surprise at the chunks of wood as a figure rose from the ground behind him without missing a beat.

Bear stabbed his ninjatō towards the heart but it was blocked by the hilt of the missing-nin's sword. For someone carrying that giant monstrosity of what he called a sword, he sure moved quick. Following that momentum, our enemy swiped his sword through the water and brought up a wave. The seemingly fluid water cut open Bear's wooden barrier like butter but it still gave him enough time to counteract the attack with his own water release, disrupting the blade-like edge formed by the water and stopping it in its track.

Before the former Kiri-nin could follow up with another attack, I jumped into the fray. This knee-deep sea might be my worst battlefield, but it sure wasn't Bear's. Spikes made of water shot up from the ground and aimed to impale me. Quickly, I flickered to avoid them as they followed each of my steps, shooting up water violently. Just as my feet touched the water after jumping out of the way of a water spike, I felt the slight swirl of water beneath me.

That spot turned to a whirlpool rapidly and a broken piece of the wooden column was dragged down without any resistance. I appeared at the man's right back corner, switching the swords in an instant so that the tantō rested in my right hand and the longer blade in my left. The giant sword - Samehada, I remembered what it was called – made a backhand strike and sailed in an arc. I ducked my head to avoid the sword before raising my left hand and pushed Samehada – not to hold it back but to move it forward. The force in that small 'clink' exploded the moment my ninjatō touched the other sword, forcing his sword arm wide open. Lightly but firmly, I took a step forward until I was within an arm's length with my enemy.

I slashed the short blade upward as if I were aiming to slice his neck open, the blade already glowing silver, just like before. Already anticipated this coming, my enemy moved his upper body backwards to escape the trajectory of the blade while also thrusting his free hand towards my neck. One jab and I had no doubt my neck would break right there.

Still, I didn't retract my sword and go on the defence. Instead, just as the swing of my sword seemed to lose its steam, I flicked the tantō with my wrist so the tip of the blade sailed over his face, casting a shade of silver. His hand slowed for a moment before reaching the skin on my neck and this time, I wasted no time in getting out of his vicinity.

Catching the rare moment when the genjutsu was taking its effect, my teammate immediately activated his wood release. The first column bashed into the missing-nin's wrist and another wrapped around Samehada and forcibly wrenched it out of his hand while the rest grew vigorously to restrain our enemy.

The genjutsu was long dead, not that I was expecting it to last long. That moment was all I needed to make the hand seals for Fire Release: Fire Dragon Flame Bullets. Long streams of fire that resemble Chinese dragons crashed into the layers of wood that just kept on sprouting from the ground to wrap the missing-nin and his weapon alike into a cocoon. The fire dragons lit up the wooden columns and raged even stronger as it used up the wood as the combustion fuel. In less than a second, it engulfed the missing-nin whole.

Without any excess exchange, Bear and I ran. We both had the feeling that the fire wouldn't keep the S-rank missing-nin restrained for long, and before that happened, we would need to get as far away from him as possible.

We didn't run very far, much to my dismay. When we were barely out of the knee-deep pool, my fire got doused in a whoosh before I saw a freaking water dragon - with a size that was all my fire dragons combined - charging into us from behind.

Before I could do something, my partner had already started to make his own hand seals. Besides being a one-of-a-kind wood release user, Bear was also a kickass water and earth release master. As for Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet, it was the signature of all water release masters.

The same water dragon arose from where Bear was standing with the same impressive size as the enemy's. The two dragons clashed violently, sending shockwaves through the air and the water. Nevertheless, Bear's water dragon successfully held off the attempt made by our enemy to flood us. The trouble was far from over because there were sharks charging at us and Hoshigaki Kisame was on top of one of them.

The scene of sharks riding the waves would have been majestic, if not for the smug man standing on the back of a shark with an oversized bat.

Still, even before the water dragons broke apart, I had already unsheathed both of my swords and started to send impulses of lightning chakra down the blades.

The chirping electricity gathered at the blades and I did not hesitate to put in everything I could by compressing the chakra further and further. As soon as the sharks were revealed behind the veil of waterfall created by the earlier clashes, I struck the two swords together and the small 'clink' was soon overwhelmed by the crackling noise as six lightning dragons shot out of the blades and went straight for the field full of sharks.

There was no time for warnings before the dragons blasted the sharks into pieces as it coursed through the water, frying everything in its path.

We stood on the outcrops of the rocky field and observed warily as the water slammed into the stones and splashed everywhere, causing bursts of electricity to jump up now and then.

When the flash finally died down, I couldn't find any signs of a body, alive or charred. Instantly, my body tensed in preparation for a surprise attack, until I realised that there was something missing in the water that used to be everything.

He was gone, along with all of his chakra infused in the water.

"Shit, that was only a clone," I cursed with a mixed feeling in my chest. On the one hand, I felt frustrated that a clone had forced me to waste so much chakra; on the other hand, I couldn't help but feel lucky that it was just the clone, despite the fact that this highly functional clone had just destroyed any chance that we had for returning to Konoha unnoticed.

"We need to go, they'll be onto us soon." I nodded immediately at Bear's words. Bear did not specify who he had referred to as 'they' - The Amegakure shinobi, the Root agent, or both. But either way, I wanted to get the hell out of here before the real missing-nin appeared.

Quietly, we slipped away without ever looking back, running fervently to put as much distance between us and Amegakure as possible.

"It's a two-day journey back to Konoha but since we're not taking the most predictable path, it will take two and a half days," I said, pointing at the drawing on the sand that was made of lines only we could make out. After three hours of running, we were ready to discuss the inevitable journey back to Konoha.

"The message takes one day, maybe? If he is using the same ink bird as before, that is. Let's say Root travels at the same speed as us, that means the next day is relatively safe to recover the chakra but we would probably be stepping into Root's scouting range around the middle of our second day." I muttered quietly under my breath, trying to figure out a plausible timeline.

"The last day's journey will be in the Fire Country's forest. The vegetation is thick, it wouldn't be the worst place to play hide and seek with Root," Bear said and I agreed silently. Anything was better than the open fields of water at this point. "Anyway, I think we should notify Hokage-sama."

I looked up and paused for a moment before nodding slowly. "You're right. Danzō's going to need a lot of Root agents to catch us. If we're going to get fucked up, Kakashi better takes advantage of this and find that damn base if he hasn't done so already."

"That's not quite I was hoping for but I guess that makes sense too." Bear looked like he was holding in an exasperated sigh. "Perhaps our allies in Konoha could provide more direct help than that."

 _You mean praying that Hokage-sama actually did some work while we are away and finally figured out that mysterious identification seal I have heard so much about?_ I didn't think Bear deserved that much sarcasm packed in one sentence, so all I did was nod at his words.

"You think we can get a hawk from one of the border stations?" I asked. We didn't bring any means of communication with us, seeing that the cover story was that we never left, not that it worked in fooling anyone.

"We might want to avoid identifying ourselves to Konoha border stations and patrols. There's always the possibility of a spy and the last thing we need is exposing our exact point of entry." He brought up a good point.

"Then I guess we will have to steal, I mean, borrow one from them without asking," I said with nonchalance. It would be fine. People borrowed resources all the time in times of need.

"Meanwhile, just try to keep the chakra recovering at a constant rate." Casually, I wiped the ground with my feet and erased any traces of our abstract map. I looked past the long stretch of marshland ahead of us and caught the dot-sized trees that seemed to emerge past the horizon. "We've got a long journey ahead of us."

(づ。◕‿‿◕。)づ fuwa~fuwa~desu~~~

"Damn it, Itachi! If only you had been faster, we could have gotten here before the Ame-nins." Itachi listened to his partner's complaints and he had no intention of reacting in any way, shape or form. By the looks of things, a quick skirmish happened here that resulted in Kisame's clone - a water clone mixed with shadow clone properties - dissipating.

When they had arrived after much nagging from Kisame's part, the Ame-nins had already started to examine the scene. Since Konan was with them, she had absolutely forbidden them from marching up to the field and demanding a clearance. So, they had to wait until the Ame-nins left before they could step up and examine the scene, much to Kisame's anger.

"We could just go kill everyone and blame it on the two Konoha shinobi I had fought with earlier if the stern lady wasn't here to stop us." Kisame turned his face to Konan, giving her an expression that said nothing but murder. To her credit, all Konan did was stare back dispassionately.

"Or you could have just killed the Konoha-nin while you still had the chance." Needless to say, Konan couldn't care less about Kisame's murderous intents. One of her paper origami flew towards the scene and as soon as it had touched the water, it was engulfed by a current of electricity.

On the other side of the field, the Ame-nin only stayed at the site for a few minutes and after some of them got electrocuted when they stepped in the water (which made Kisame laughed sadistically), they left with sour faces.

"I didn't expect that girl to have the guts to electrocute me while standing in the middle of a pond. She would have been sucked dry if it was the real Samehada. You can't trust anything with those 30% fakes," Kisame complained as he swung his giant sword into the water. Immediately, Samehada broke free of its constraints and flexed its teeth to devour the lightning chakra left in the water.

"Then why do you keep sending it to do your job?" Konan commented. Itachi wasn't sure if her ability to send Kisame into raging fits with every word was intentional or just instinctual. Either way, he approved.

Itachi stared at the flooded field. No matter how much of a glutton Samehada was, it couldn't erase the gut-wrenching feeling brought by this familiar chakra signal that screamed for his attention. _Why was she here, now of all times? If she had come even an hour later ..._ If he could, he was sure that he would be drenched in cold sweat by now.

"You are not going to believe this, but I saw the Sharingan, so either that Uchiha came from Konoha, or another one of your kins has gone off the rocker." His partner directed the conversation back to him, having temporarily forgotten about slaying Konan in order to pursue his curiosity. Still, even with all the eyes on him, he just stayed like a stone statue and let out an ambiguous 'Hn' as an answer.

"I thought you killed your whole family?" _So why is there still one of your species running around?_ Itachi mentally sighed at his partner's unvoiced question. Technically, he never said he had killed his whole family, Kisame just assumed without checking the reliability of that important information. However, with the cold hard glare from Konan behind him, Itachi knew that he needed to say something that only a psychopath would say.

"Sharingan are hard to harvest and the Mangekyou even more so. I left my sister alive because I still need her eyes. Her eyes were so pathetically weak when I massacred the rest of them, there was no point in taking her eyes until they are developed," Itachi said with a chilling calmness, spitting out the speech he had rehearsed so many times in his head until he had almost believed it himself. Almost, but never had.

"Well, that's why I told you to go faster, you punk. You would have had her eyes if we were five minutes earlier. Hell, I would have even let you have the pleasure of gouging her eyes out yourself and that's a huge honour coming from me," Kisame rambled in his usual sense of bloodlust. His partner never cared for his comments and threats, and if Itachi wanted to stay under his cover, he shouldn't either.

"We are not supposed to start a fight before this. There is no point anyway, it's only a matter of time before I acquire her eyes." Itachi said in a voice that was stripped of all emotional colour, despite knowing that he had said more than he would ever say on any normal day.

Still, just for the sake of it, Itachi gave Konan a bland look that silently asked, _"Can I go after them?"_

"Itachi is right. Pein's order was to stay around the village, not stir up any trouble that can warn other hidden villages of the true change that's about to come. We have caused enough trouble here, Pein will not be pleased," the woman said almost in a rhythmic voice with a rare intonation in her voice.

"Then what the hell do you need us for? He can slaughter the entire Amegakure all by himself if he wants - don't tell me he doesn't think so. You told us to get rid of anyone running away from the village because you wanted to 'make sure' and now you're unhappy? Our time could have been spent elsewhere instead of coming here and playing guards." Kisame growled and despite their differences in fundamental motivations, Itachi was inclined to agree. If he hadn't needed to come here, he wouldn't have had to be questioned about his sister, his family, and everything.

"I said _after_ it starts," Konan emphasised, not at all fazed by the menacing sword pointed at her. She paused for a moment, her brows tightened slightly as if she were trying to debate something.

"Leave them be, they are not here for Hanzō." Finally, she stated. As for how she got that information, Itachi had an idea with how the paper cranes fluttered around her before returning to her body. As for why she decided not to pursue them, that was left to the imagination.

Suddenly, a paper crane flew to her, fluttering its wings like crazy. Konan narrowed her eyes at the metallic village against the sunset backdrop.

"Bored? There's a bounty mission in Kusagakure that hasn't been completed yet. It's yours, but not now. It's going to start soon." Without any further ado, she turned around and walked away without sparing the flooded field or Kisame another glance.

Of course, Kisame cursed and protested relentlessly. No S-rank missing-nin liked to be ordered around but Akatsuki gave them enough freedom that most of them knew that the long-term benefits outweighed the temporary displeasure. So quickly, he followed Konan with a murderous face as Itachi trailed behind without any sense of urgency.

After all, it was such a rare moment of peace where he wasn't explicitly ordered to hunt down his sister.

Before he left, he saw the protruding porcelain mask that was half buried in the mud - a Konoha issued Anbu mask. The cat ears and the whisker paints stuck out from the mud like a sore thumb. The mask laid in such a weird angle, making it look like someone behind the mask was buried there.

Without any warning, the space was distorted and a man faded into existence. He picked up the mask and wiped the mud off of the surface, revealing the beautiful white colour underneath.

Itachi swore that the man waved at him with the mask before he was once again sucked in by the distorted space.

* * *

So, this arc will reach its end soon, probably in three or so chapters after this, so don't expect a smooth ride XD.


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